Why i am wrong about the Aryan Invasion
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Category: Regional History or Period History
Forum Name: History of the South Asian subcontinent
Forum Discription: The Indian sub-continent and South Central Asia
URL: http://www.allempires.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=22427
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Topic: Why i am wrong about the Aryan Invasion
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Subject: Why i am wrong about the Aryan Invasion
Date Posted: 08-Nov-2007 at 19:17
| The aryan invasion theory of the sub continent is a topic that i have been studying for a long time and have come to the conclusion that it is just an absurd idea and the direction of the movement was the opposite. Most of the people here however do believe in Aryan Invasion Theory more so in its mild form. So i ask those people that please prove me wrong here and prove that they are right |
Replies:
Posted By: SuN.
Date Posted: 09-Nov-2007 at 02:57
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Take heart Dear, all revolutionaries & revolutionary ideas face a lot of skepticism initially. The law of inertia applies to philosophies too. |
Posted By: SuN.
Date Posted: 09-Nov-2007 at 03:12
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Following are some of the main reasons for people not accepting your theory : 1. People are somehow still to get out of the colonial thought process firmly implanted by the European intelligentsia of colonial period. The movement from West to East was supposed to give credence to the superiority of the colonialists also moving from West to east. So the implied reasoning was if you accepted & worshiped Aryans who came from the West, feel the same for Europeans too. 2. Nationalistic aspirations, notions of racial purity, & the richness of Aryan culture make everybody claim themselves to be the original aryan race. Everybody wants to be able to claim physical racial superiority Fair complexion, Nordic features etc. etc. for their ancestors, again concepts of White racial superiority forgetting that the oldest civilizations of Egypt, India & China were not white. 3. The Aryan culture was one of the richest ancient ones, so almost everybody has vested interests in claiming proximity to it, now or in distant past. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 09-Nov-2007 at 11:21
Sun it is not my theory that the Aryan Invasion Theory is wrong but rather it is the theory of a lot of other historians from whom i have learnt about its demerits. And the reasons you say that the Aryan Invasion Theory was accepted initially is spot on however i feel that it continues to be accepted is because of this tendency of academia to hold on to prevalent theories despite very strong indications that they may be not very sound. However my objective for starting this thread is mainly constructive. So i invite all the people which are interested in this matter to discuss the matter here so that we can all learn something about this very important area of world history. |
Posted By: SuN.
Date Posted: 09-Nov-2007 at 11:59
------------- God is not great. |
Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2007 at 04:00
Have you find out ,who were Aryans whose inavasion and non inavasion you want to discuss.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2007 at 15:15
Although i can answer that question now, I won't. Because first i will present my case and then i will give my conclusions so that people reading this will be in a better position to judge the merits of that conclusion. So please any one if you believe in the Aryan invasion theory there must be some reason that you believe in it. What are those reasons? |
Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2007 at 15:55
Now Do you have some specific people in your mind who were called Aryan than you or we can discuss there invasion or non invasion , However If you don't know who were Aryans at all than what is the use of presenting your case ?
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Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 10-Nov-2007 at 22:36
So you want others to talk first ?
 The title is ' Why I am wrong about the aryan invasion' Now, we haven't seen any explanation/arguments yet. Instead of that, we are asked to talk. Would be better if the title was 'Why do you guys believe in the Aryan invasion'.
No info here why the AMT is so absurd, or why it should be viceversa. Ok lets help it a bit and see what is coming.
First , few ( in mainstream field ) use the term Aryan Invasion Theory ( AIT) anymore, so it would be best not to use obsolete terms. Since the academic supporters of an Indo-European migration to (what is now) India rather use AMT ( Aryan Migration ), its better to use the modern term .
Also, when discussing AMT its better to concentrate on the modern views instead of repeating every old view of the 19 th century scholars ( as some do , hoping to discredit modern views) . There are differences.
The first thing is checking if there is some agreement about certain things :
Do you agree there are Indo- Europeam (IE) languages ( together called the IE language family ) ?
If so, we can exchange various evidences of whether they were introduced into what is now India (AMT ), or they went 'Out of India' ( socalled OIT ) and spread towards Europe etc , leading to the various language groups etc.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 04:33
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The format of this thread which i had in mind was that people would present their arguments for the AIT and i would refute them however since people want me to go first therefore i will. One of the first argument that comes in people minds for the Aryan Invasion Theory is -There is a sharp division between the Aryan and Dravidian languages in the sub-continent which very strongly points towards an invasion of the sub-continent by the Aryans. My answer to that is - The subcontinent is a huge place, it is called "sub-continent" for a reason. And human habitation in this region goes quite farther back in time with records of homo-erectus being in this region. In prehistoric times with very little limited means of communication the differentiaition of languages was much more than what we currently observe. What the improved means of commnication did was that it increasingly brought previously isolated communities in contact with eachother and whichever people in that interaction had the upper hand, for whichever reason, that resulted in their culture along with their language being more represented in their combined culture with some elements from the more passive culture as well as their language being preserved in the amalgam of the cultures. And this phenomena of languages and cultures getting extinct is well preserved in recorded history. For example Sargon of Agade adopted a policy of linguistic assimulation after he had conquered all the Sumerian cities which caused Sumerian, which is not relared to any language which we know of becoming extinct. See my point one of the first expansionist excercises in recorded history directly causing the extinction of a langauge. We also have a similar example in history in the Roman Empire whose expansionism led to a lot of languages including many non indo-europea ones like Eutriscean, Iberian etc. getting extinct. Similarly European expansion after the 16th century caused extinction of many native langauges of Australia and the Americas. Europe even now has a few non-indo European languages like Hungarian, Estonian, Finnish, Sami and Basque. So why if Europe can have this linguistic diversity, then the Sub-Continent is denied one. That was what European thinking like was back in the imperial days which can briefly be sumarised as "stereotypical" thinking where they just slaped vast areas and people with one name and then the people within those realms were expected to behave uniformaly and when they didn't behave uniformaly as is to be expected then one of them must have been the indigenous and the rest invaders, why can't they all be indigenous the sub continent is a big place and it is perfeclty able to accomodate ore than one language groups infact in such a big place you should expect to find some language diversity. Now of course the hunter gatherers had no senese of geography and moved around a lot but tracing these movements so far back in time are impossible and irrelevant to the context. What matters is that with the begining of settled life these people were in their historically recorded habitat. Now as i said that the sub-continent is a big place and language diversity is to be expected, the caucasus being only a fraction of the size of the sub-continent by virtue of its boken geography has more langauge groups than the sub-continent and aside from the indo-european group we know that all of the other groups are actually native to that region because they exist nowhere but outside that region. There are only three major language groups of the Sub-Continent the Aryan, the Dravidian and the Austro-Asiatic group. Out of these groups we know that the Austro-Asiatic group is not native to this region because it belongs to the souh-east asian language group and most of the migration of their people to the sub-continent is recorded in medievel times and the other more older groups like the Mundas are demonstratably also of south-east asian origin. So that leaves us with only Dravidian and Aryan. Now i believe that in the pre historic days there may have been quite a few other language groups which may have been absorbed by Dravidians in the South and Aryans in the north. Some people think that the tribal people of South India may have spoken a different tongue before they were absorbed by the Dravidians but of course it has never been proved and maybe could never will be. As an example look at the people of the himalayas, some of the languages families which are spoken there don't have any presence in the sub-continent Brushusi the language of the kailash people has no relation to any known language family in the world, the baltistani people speak a language which belongs to the sino-tibetan group a langauge family absent in the sub-continent. The sina of the chitralis people and the kashmiri language belong to seperate langauge family distinct from all the other language families of the aryan languages and are called dardic lanuages obviously surviving only in the himalyas because of its isolation from the rest of the sub-continent. Same applies to the Aryan and Dravidian that they remained separted because of isolation, if not because of geography then certainly because of distance. And besides they both have borrowed much from eachother as can be gauged by the fact that the Maurya king after conquering much of the north actually instituted the creation of prakrit a combination of Sanskrit and Tamil much like Sargon of Agade had attempted a linguistic assimulation many centuries earlier, and it became the linga franca of the Mauryan Empire (even though it was hated by the conservative northern Brahmins)and that is how most of the languages of the North became heavily Dravidized as most of them have been heavily influenced by Prakrit if not being directly descended from it. Even though the Aryans in the north did have the knowledge of the South even Sri Lanka as we can see in "Ramayan" whose composition most place even before Mahabharta however it wasn't until much later that after the Mauryan conquests that the South came under the same umbrella as the North. Now for the "Brauhi" matter. Most researchers who take the name of Brauhi in this matter do so with much caution because the fact is that they could have come from anywhere and at anytime. They may have arrived there from the south in the Gupta days in the classical age times or in the medievel times. The idea that they may have been the survivors of the Indus Valley Civilization does not hold any ground because then it begs the question that if some Dravidian people were able to survive in the hot spot then why don't we see many such pockets of Dravidian people in the other parts of northern India and central India. These Brauhvi people may have even been living there in the harappan times that still doesn't make their surrounding population any less Aryan. As an analogy consider the presence of the Sinhalese in Srilanka which are an Aryan people and form 72 percent of the population while the other group the tamils form the rest of the population. Now we know that the Sinhalese are not native to that region because we have documented evidence of their migration from the nort western part of the sub continent to Sri Lanka but of course that doesn't mean that they are native to that region or that Tmails are foreigners to Srilanka or least of all that the Aryans actually originated in Srilanka because we know that they migrated to that region same with the Brauhvi people. In the case of Sri Lanka a majority cannot decide the non-indigeousness of a minority let a minority deciding the non-indigousness of the majority as in the case of the Brauhvis. And if the Brauhvis had been living in that region since the destruction of Harappa then wouldn't you expect the language of those people to borrow much elements from the surrounding languages which would be indo-aryan languages Punjabi and Sindhi. However the Brauhvi shows little borrowing from these languages and actually has much in common with Baluchi. Now the arrival of Baluchis in this region is quite recent historically speaking with them arriving here in 1300 A.D because of the Persian expansion. So the question is that why did the Brauhvi borrwed so little from the Indo-Aryan languages with which it had contact for so long yet borrow so much from a much recent arrival. I think that you will find that answer in the Rig Vedic verse which clearly chorincled the conflict between the Indo-Aryans and the Iranians where it describes the ‘Battle of Ten Kings’ with a confederacy of 10 peoples, namely, Pakhta, Bhalana, Alina, Siva, Visanin, Simyu, Bhrgu, Prthu, and Parsu. The names pakhta (pakhtuns), bhalana (bolan/baloch), Prhtu(Parthians) and Parsu (persians) are unmistakenably the names of the Iraniana tribes. What is quite interesting is the name Brghu which is an exact coginate of Brauhvi (try calling them out both to find out how similar they are). Now it might seem that the Brghu were a Dravidian or may be one group of a few groups of Dravidian people living in that area who might have also joined the sect of the Iranians (Zoarastrism) and were expelled from the greater punjab (the battle took place in the punjab) with the other Iranians. The fact that they have a presence in Afghanistanm, Iran and Turkemanistan all traditional adobes of the Iranian people yet have no presence in the other parts of the subcontinent even South India should also hold some weight. And lets take the example of China. Before the rise of the han dynasty it is speculated that there may have more than one language families in Chinam, even now the Sino-Tibetean language family is a very lose family grouping much less so than the Aryan language families. And when you look at the geography of China you will find that right to the east most of China is Japan and then a bit further back is Korea. In the north east of Japan is an island inhabitted by the Ainu people. The rest of Japan is inhabitted by the Japanese people and Korea is inhabitted by the Korean people and then China naturally is inhabitted by the Chinese. Now the language of the Ainu people and the Japanese people and the Korean people are langauge isolates i.e they don't fall in any of the other known language family in the world much less China. So what are we to deduce from this. Going by the model which we apply in the sub-continent for the Aryan and Dravidian languages should we assume that all of China, Korea, Japan was inhabitted by the Ainu people then the Japanese came from... well somehwere and snatched all of China, Korea and Japan from the Ainu people who were pushed back to the small islands in the North East of Japan. Then the Koreans came from... well somewhere, and they then snatched all of China and Korea from the Japanese and pushed the Japanese to the east to the islands of Japan. And then finally the Chinese arrived on the scene from.... well again from somewhere and they snatched China from the Koreans and pushed the Koreans to Korea. Does that all make any sense? Of course not, the presence of language family in a place disitinct from another language does not automatically mean that they were pushed there by that other group. They both could have been there... well since a long time without any one being responsible for large scale movement of any other group. Same is the case with the sub-continent. The Aryan languages existed in the north of the sub-continent while the Dravidian languages existed in the south of the sub-cotinent since ... well since a very long time and no single group pushed any one to a particular area. Lets take the example of Europe. Europe in the olden times was technologically much behinde most of the other parts of the world and in addition to that it had a very broken geography. The result of that was that there was a lack of communication between the people of Europe which naturally gave rise to many language groups. If you look at the particular nations of Europe you will find that these nations cover much less geographic space than individual ethnicities of the sub-continent like punjabis, sindhis or Gujratis. The reason is simple the sub-continent had a much more continous geography as well as being one of the more developed regions of the world which meant better communication between the people which resulted in a larger area belonging to a certain cultural entity. However in modern times the situation has reversed. Europe has gained a large technological lead and one of the most immediate effects of this improved technology is better communicaton between people across the globe. Cars, aeroplanes, jets, ships, printing press, telephones, television etc all of these have meant that the people acros the globes are better connected. So now if you look at the area occupied by Europeans which can be said to belong to a certain Ehtnicity the area occupied by them is much larger than areas occupied by a certain ethnicity in the sub-continent. For example the USA, Canada, Russia, Brazil, Argentenia etc are countries with huge areas which dwarf the area occupied by Punjabis, or Sindhis of the sub-continent. However in old Europe still can see the effets of an age where the means of communications were very limited as the area occupied by the ethnicities is usually much smaller than the area occupied by the ethnicities in the sub-continent. In fact at one time it was predicted that English as spoken in Australia, Enlgand, USA and SOth Africa would with time would grow so apart that they would become mutually un-intellgible. That didn't happen because the modern means of communication made sure that the people were well connected which made the need for a standard form of communication much more and that kept their dialects of English from moving apart much aside from some differences in local accents. My point is that in the olden times the means of communication were primitive because of which groups of people were much less connected which resulted in much greater language differentiation. And in as big a place as the sub-continent this resulted in two distinct language families being preserved. And also The Dravidians had no recollection of having ever been pushed to the south by the Aryans. Infact their tales tells just the opposite, that they came further south of the sub-continent as massive floods pushed them there and the land which they came from to the south of the sub-continent was submerged by the massive floods of which Sri-Lanka is a remaining hill top. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 06:03
I perfectly know that who were the Aryans. However if i say that right now i feel that this thread will become very confrontational. People will attack the conclusion rather than the arguments as i would not have presented them yet which i feel would be counter-productive. So my format in this discussion would be that i will give my arguments one by one so that people will discuss the validity of those individual arguments. And finally when all the arguments have been presented and discussed the logical conclusion of those arguments will be presented. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 06:19
As this discussion goes on we will see that why the Aryan Invasion Theory is so absurd.
This is also a point which we will discuss thoroughly here. |
Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 11:07
Good post .
let us use proper terms which is ' AMT v/s OIT 'as you should not debate where non exist .
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 11:21
oK Next...
What are you talking man ???What is the source of this enlightenment ???
So you believe in OIT .
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 12:23
Why don't you learn a bit about Prakrit. Your questions will be answered there. |
Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 13:45
Who gave this information to you that there was no Prakrit earlier and Moryas were the kings who created Prakrit from Sanskrit and Tamil language.
Bilal you are obviously new and perhaps don't know that parkrit is not just a mixture of Tamilian and Sanskrit words .
Anyway you can educate us on Prakrit if you know more about it.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 17:25
Prakrit is not just one language it is actually the name for many languages who share the same structure. The earliest references that which we have of Prakrit are the Ashokan edicts who as you know was a Mauryan king. And check the history of Prakrit you will find out that Prakrit was actively supported by the ruling class of khashtrya in place of Sanskrit around the Mauryan times. And the Brahmins of the north were very unhappy with Prakrit taking the place of Sanskrit. These are historical facts and you can check them for yourself. Many people describe Prakrit as a vulgarization of Sanskrit with the Dravidian languages which matches my description of Prakrit very well. Are you disputing the fact that Prakrit has much Dravidian influence while at the same time looking like that it descended from Sanskrit. So please enlighten me that where i am wrong about Prakrit and how and why. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 18:26
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Bilal,
a major weakness with the OIT is linguistic. Vedic Sanskrit, as well as all Indo-Aryan languages have a Dravidian substratum, including the use of retroflexes which are alien to all other IE languages. Vedic Sanskrit also has a number of non-IE loanwords from Dravidian and Munda languages which are absent from other IE languages. If all IE people came from India, is it just coincidence they all selectively forgot the use of retroflexes and other Dravidian influences which are present in the earliest forms of Sanskrit? Also, there are older attested IE languages than Sanskrit, including members of the Anatolian branch. How can this be explained by OIT? |
Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 11-Nov-2007 at 18:39
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Prakrit stands just for vernacular languages that evolved in to present languages of India,like Punjabi ,Haryanvi ,Rajsthani ,Brij maghadhi etc..etc.. Ask any modern linguistic scholar whether any of these languages are a mix of Tamil and Sanskrit .
Prakrit just evolved in to modern languages ...Sanskrit language comes no where in between .neither in the beginning neither at the end.
These vernacular languages were spoken as such before Asoka ,it is just the mention of earliest known inscriptions when you refer to Asoka inscription.
Btw do you know earliest Sanskrit inscriptions (king Rudradman)are recorded after appox 500 years of these Prakrit inscriptions.
So can we safely conclude that Sanskrit was introduced by him in India.
Prakrit just mean original unadulterated ,Sanskrit means refined .
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Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 12-Nov-2007 at 04:34
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Bilal, its is a long post but there is no evidende of OIT in it. We need something else to work with.
As another has pointed out, there are certain obstacles for the OIT. IE languages must come from somewhere, so if they did not come out of India than they obviously went to it.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 14-Nov-2007 at 18:14
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Yes it is the prime objection against the indigousness of the Aryan however it is not something which a detailed study of the subject can not resolve. So i will answer that now. The names of places and rivers in what is now Pakistan and North Western India have no Dravidian subtratum. It is somewhat anomaly as it is usually the case that the invaders take up the native names of the places which they conquered from the natives. As an example take a look at the huge number of places and river namse in the USA which have a native american source for example Michigan, Massachusets, Oklahoma, Missisipi etc. Similarly all the four major cites of Spain have arabic names as even if the muslim arabs were not exactly natives but still they did rules Spain for about 700 years from which the next wave of people of Spain took up the administration. Gordoba is arabic Qurtaba, Grenada is arabic Gharnata, barcelona is arabic Bargelona and Madrid is arabic Magrid. If Aryans were invaders then you expect them to adopt at least some native names for the places and rivers of the region which we can then detect as a Dravidian substratum. But no, almost all of the important and chief places of the region have Aryan names. Now about the Dravidian substratum in vedic Sanskrit. Now many people are of the opinion that Sanskrit was a composed language. Its very clear set of rules and precise grammer stands in stark contrast to organic langaues which are a lot more ambitious and arbitrary. Now Sanskrit had been for all known history the standard language of northern sub-continent and it was never known to be the native language of any people. We all know about the Harappan civilization however the roots of Harappan civilization stretch very far back into antiquity. Infact each student who is learning Sanskrit is told that the development of Sanskrit took one thousand years after which it was considered complete. Again maybe hinting at the composed rather than the natural nature of the language. Now although the Sanskrit is the closest language to Proto-Aryan that which we know of however there are some features of Sanskrit which are more of a development than some of the other Aryan languages like Greek. Again hinting that although it retains many of the proto-aryan features some of its features hint at a development of the langauge from an earlier existing languages. The pre-harappan culture of Mehrgarh began in the 8th millenium B.C which then flowered into the Harappan civilization. The people living a settled life in those region felt the need for a common language and developed Sanskrit as a result. The language must have had its roots in the languages spoken in that area while still being slightly different from each one them as it may have had absorbed the elements from many of those languages while at the same time having some of its own unique features. As I have said in my earlier post that there may have been some groups of Dravidian people living in the Indus area (read my earlier post on the Brauhi people) and Sanskrit may have taken a few elements from their languages also. But the other Aryan people living in the region and speaking their own organic languages would not have had those Dravidian elements in their languages. When a migration from a region having more than one group of people takes place it does not happen that the migrating party has representatives from all the groups of the region. Rather it usually the case that the migrating party consists of individuals from just a few of the total ethnic groups. And the languages which as a result get transfered from the region are the ones which are the native languages of the people who migrate not all of the languages of the area. I don't think that it is much of a stretch to think that if Aryans were the predominant groups of that area then the people who migrated from there to Europe or Afghanistan were Aryans as most of the people inhabiting that area would be Aryans and these Aryans would be speaking native languages which would not have had a Dravidian substratum.. yet!. Now the Dravidan elements are almost completely absent in the Rig Veda the earliest of the vedic texts while the Dravidian elements start to creep in the later vedas. The Iranian separation took place at the time of the Rig Veda as the Rig Veda clearly chronicles the conflict between the Iranians and the sub-continentals. And the European migrations may have taken place just a little bit earlier. Now Rig Veda if you try to date it without making the assumption of an Aryan Invasion then it can be dated to at least 4300 B.C. How?. Well there are many arguments which point towards that conclusion however the main and most conclusive evidence being the dating through astronomical references. This is a bit of a complex and convoluted topic which i will discuss in more detail in the coming posts. Right now just know that the Vedic Aryans saw some astronomical phenomena and recorded them in their literature. However with the knowledge of their times they had no way of being able to back calculate these dates form a later date. We can with our modern knowledge back calculate the dates of these phenomena from a later date however that was not the case at those times. The Vedic aryans by their own methods would have arrived at much different dates for the phenomena which they were recording, than the dates which they reported. They had to be present there in person to be able to record the phenomena and give those dates for the phenomena which they reported. And these dates for the texts are much earlier than what is currently thought. One of such an astronomical reference is in the Rig Veda which points to an astronomical phenomena which occurred in 4300 B.C. And also keep in mind that these dates and methodology was given by the mathematical luminary "playfair" and although many criticized his conclusion no one has been able to refute his methodology. And as i said that the Rig Veda clearly chorincles the clash between the Iranians and the Rig Vedic aryans. So the separation between the rig vedic aryans and Iranians must have taken place around 4300 B.C. I think that the European invasions may have taken place earlier. Reason, well there really isn't much mention of in any of the literature of as dramatic an out flux of people as the Eurpean invasions would have required meaning that i really don't know but its just a conjecture. As i have said that the Dravidian substratum is almost completely absent in Rig Veda adn Rig Veda was mistakenably composed in Punjab as it is full of geographic references about the land of Punjab the place of composition of Rig Veda. Now if that is the case then you would expect that the Dravidian elements would be quite visible in the Rig Veda if not in anything else then at least in the names of the places and rivers but that is not the case. All the rivers and places names are of aryan origin. Meaning that when the Rig Veda was composed not only was this area predominantly Aryan but the regions which they were inhabiting was so familiar to them that they had names for those places which were of their own language rather than taking the names from another language to refer to the places which were unfamiliar to them. In fact these Dravidian names should be most plentiful in the Rig Veda as the invader gradually learns about the Geography of the invaded place and does not have to rely on the geographical expertise of the place of the Natives e.g It is highly unlikely that a place named in the USA will have a native American source or a place named in Spain will have an Arabic source in modern times. As i have already said that the Austro-Asiatic language family is not native to the sub-continent but rather belongs to the south east asian language family. We have documented proof of most of these south east asian tribes migrating into the sub-continent in medievel times. The older group of Munda also belongs to the Austro-Asiatic group and i think that its not that great a leap of faith if we assume that the Munda people also migrated just like the other Autro-Asiantic group somehwere in the distant but also not so distant past. The Munda people arrived into the subcontinent i think much later than 4300 B.C a time when most of the European and Iranian migrations would have taken place. And also the European invasions must have taken place from the punjab which is right at the opposite end of the sub-continent from where these groups would have entered. So when the people of the Indus migrated they would have taken their native languages with them which uptil then would have little Dravidian or Munda substratum. And the people who stayed back would incorporate Dravidian and Munda elements into their languages as time went on as these people were living right next door to them while the European and Iranian branches developed according to their own circumstances. The Iranian and European branches have parted ways about 6500 years ago. That is a lot of time. And all of these languages would have grown apart and incorporated elements which would be absent in the other branches. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 14-Nov-2007 at 18:37
The only language of the Anatolian branch which has features older than Sanskrit is Hittite. The language of the Mitannis is very close to Sanskrit. The Hittites were ruling over a non-aryan "Hattic" population. They themselves were heavily mesopotamized as can be gauged by theri pantheon of Gods which were basically mesopotamian gods which the Hittites incorporated into their religion. And as for the Hittite language it is very different from all the other aryan languages not just Sanskrit so much so that there had been suggestion that the Hittite should be called a sister of the Aryan languages rather than a daughter one. Also Hittite has been found to be actually simpler than many of the later Aryan languages which is anomaly as it is the daughter languages which are supposed to get simpler with time as the sounds in individual languages become specialized. The most obvious interpretation of all these facts is that the language of the Hittites like themselves mixed heavily with local languages which resulted in the Hittite language not just differing from the other aryan languages but also incorporating elements from other non-aryan languages which in the context of Aryan languages made them seem older than some of the other aryan languages such as Sanskrit. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 14-Nov-2007 at 19:50
I know that there is no evidence of OIT in it. I made that post to counter an argument which is frequently raised against OIT. It is my intention in this thread to first answer the objections against OIT and then give my arguments for OIT.
One concept that should be recognized in this discussion is the concept of Soft and hard evidence. Soft evidence is when something points towards a possible conclusion while hard evidence is something which pretty much proves a conclusion. With almost all places where we have any hope of finding any concrete evidence of the origin of the Aryan people in light of these soft evidence being ruled out those places have come into favor where there is very little or bound to be very little evidence for the Aryan people. There is nothing remotely Aryan about Catal Hyuk (Anatolia) and the only thing Aryan about the Kurgan culture is the horse. There are no signs of a culture having the resources and the demographics for the Aryan Invasions and i sense that eventually Kurgan hypothesis will also be abandoned because there will not be sufficient evidence. And soon experts will have to realize that they need to be mindful of this soft and hard evidence matter. Most of the facts have many interpretation and when you are dealing with time lines of thousands of years and across geographies thousands of miles there are bound to be many facts that when viewed from a certain looking glass would support a certain conclusion. While there will also be many facts which will negate that conclusion. That has been the problem with the Aryan debate because of the politics involved many take up such soft evidence which in a certain way supports a certain conclusion while at the same time ignoring facts which go against that conclusion. As one said about such debate "are only on a mission to prove what they want to prove" The matter of Sanskrit is also such an example of soft evidence. Of course if Sanskrit had all the features of proto-aryan then that would automatically mean that OIT is correct. However just because Sanskrit is not proto-aryan doesn' t mean that OIT is wrong. There are many ways in which this fact can be explained away for OIT. e.g it is a bit of a stretch to think that the aryans speaking proto-aryan suddenly had a vision when the European and Iranian groups were migrating that the aryan group of languages would on day cover a big chunk of the world and felt the need to preserve proto-aryan as a time capsule in Sanskrit. In all likeliness they never had such a vision when the European and Iranian sub-groups were migrating and Sanskrit may be a development which took place much later after the European and Iranian migrations, that is why it is not proto-aryan. And it can also e explained away as that Sanskrit being a composed language had features which were a further development than the native languages of the region which were proto-aryan languages and when they migrated from that region they took only the native languages and didn't take the elite language as is the case most of the times as when the European powers colonized the world they transferred their native languages of Spanish, Portugese or English and so on while not taking the elite languages of Greek or Latin. However the astronomical evidence which i have told you about is hard evidence which supports no other conclusion that the people who mentioned of that phenomena were present there in person on the mentioned date to record those phenomena. Here there is also the clash between soft evidence and hard evidence. The Aryan Invasion theory based on many soft evidence dictates that Aryans came there in about 1500 B.C and rig veda was composed at that time at about 1500 B.C while the hard evidence says that Rig Veda must date back later than 4300 B.C. When there is a clash between hard and soft evidence i think that it is more wise to choose the conclusion of hard evidence over soft evidence. |
Posted By: ConradWeiser
Date Posted: 14-Nov-2007 at 22:03
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Very very interesting. I haven't really heard of this theory before, so I'm going to Wikipedia and the library to see what I can dig up. Thanks for renewing my interest in Indo-European origins. ------------- Another year! Another deadly blow! Another mighty empire overthrown! And we are left, or shall be left, alone. -William Wordsworth |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 15-Nov-2007 at 13:24
If you really are interested in this subject then i suggest that you broaden your horizon. Listen to both sides arguments. That what i have done. However if you restrict your research to only books then i feel that you will get only one side of the story as these books are mainly written in accordance with the AIT as AIT is the mainstream accepted theory and many of these books have arguments for the AIT which are no longer valid. So do some research on the internet as well where you will be able to find arguments for OIT. For example here is a very good book for OIT. http://koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/books/ait/index.htm And if these posts made you curious enough about this subject to investigate on your own then i have done my job. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 08:16
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-The Indus Valley people were a peace loving people and were not ready for the hostile and aggressive aryans- Yes the people of the IVC were unusually peaceful for their times but that does not mean that they were compleltely unable to defend themselves when the situation required. Peace loving and self negation are two completely different things. Being peace loving means that you don't go loking for a fight and try to solve matters without reverting to violence, self negation means that you lie down yourself to any tom, dick and harry without thinking for your self interests. The IVC had its roots from the 8th millenium B.C. Do you really think that this civilization for about 6500 years faced no outside threat and never felt the need to defend themselves despite living in a region which probably was the most hospitable region in the world for human habitation and was the envy of all. You don't get to be that old without being a bit pragmatic. For people who will see wihtout the assumption that the IVC people were completely sedative there are plenty of signs which tell that the IVC people were mindful of defending themselves and being militaristic when the situation required. Bronze arrow and spear heads have been found from the IVC sites. They had, what was an arrow or a spear, as one of the symbols of their script. They also had the chariot wheel as not just one of the symbols for their script but also a strong cultural motif (chariots are mainly the tools of war). Their cities were heavily fortified. And they had huge citadels looming over their cities one of whose function may have been to thwart attacks on their cities. Chess was also played there obviously meaning that the people were not totally alien to militaristic thought. I think that they were pefectly capable of defending themselves when the situation required. And Dravidians who are supposed to be the peaceful creaters of IVC are not that peaceful themselves either. War was glorified in ancient tamil poetry and the neolithic sites in South India are full of stone weapons. Kalari pyate the prpogineator of all modern eastern martial arts which is a very violent art form with daggers and swords as weapons also has its roots in the Dravidian culture of Kerala. As mr Koenard Elst said "in the jungle of humanity perfectly peaceful civilizations remain no more than a pipe dream" |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 09:49
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- The Indus Valley Civilization knew of no horse hence it cannot be Aryans- The horse was one of the most holy objects of the Aryan culturs and was part of the proto-Aryan culture. But horse did not seem to had occupied such as prominnet position in the Harappan culture and may even have been absent there so IVC cannot be an aryan culture. Now for indiations that it was the indus valley and the indo aryans are the ones which brough the horse to mesopotamia. The Sumerian sign for horse was apparently borrowed from Elamite, which was spoken on the northern (now Iranian) coast of the Persian Gulf, half-way between Sumer and the Indus Valley. The Sumerian word si-si, known in Sumerian since the fourth millennium BC, and the derived Semitic words (Hebrew sUs), were borrowed from Indo-Iranian aSva. The subcontinent's hot and humid climate leads to a very quick decay of organic matter which and that is why we find very little organic remains in the archeological sites and that would be one of the main reasons that why we don't find much organic remains there. As an example of the discrepancy between the actual use ofhorse in a period and its relative paucity the archeological record consider the situation in Hatinapur. The horse bones excavated from hastinapur in the fiirst milenium B.C make up a very small percentage of bones excavated yet the use of horse in that period is wel known. As an example of the desprepancy between the use of horse ans horse remains consider the fact that now cows are much numerous that horses as future archeologists are bound to observe in their time yet on ceremonial occasions like like rny parades you see a lot of horses but not a single cow. So archeology has confirmed of the situation in Hastinapur where the horses were few in total remains but were very important on riitual occasions as the ones reocorded in the vedas. And likewise in Vedic culture: From the Vedic texts onwards the horse is symbolic of nobility and is associated with people of status.So, the Vedic attention paid to horses was quite out of proportion with their percentage in the domesticated animal population as horses do not have much use outside of war and transportation and therefpre as result are much less in number when coampared to cattle or even donkies whose daily use is much more widespread. Compared with central asia India was relatively poor in horses, and on top of that, it was by far not as good in preserving what much of horse bones it had, for reasons outlined above. Meanwhile, in several Harappan sites remains of horses have been found. Even supporters of the AIT have admitted that the horse was known in Mohenjo Daro, near the coast of the Arabian Sea (let alone in more northerly areas), in 2500 BC at the latest.But the presence of horses and even domesticated horses has already been traced further back: horse teeth at Amri, on the Indus near Mohenjo Daro, and at Rana Ghundai on the Panjab-Baluchistan border have been dated to about 3,600 BC. More bones of the true and domesticated horse have been found in Harappa, Surkotada (all layers including the earliest), Kalibangan, Malvan and Ropar. Recently, bones which were first taken to belong to onager specimens, have been identified as belonging to the, domesticated horse (Kuntasi, near the Gujarat coast, dated to 2300 BC). Admittedly, the presence of horses in the Harappan excavation sites is not as overwhelming in quantity as in the neolithic cultures of Eastern Europe. However, the relative paucity of horse remains is matched by the fact that the millions-strong population of the Harappan civilization, much larger than that of Egypt and Mesopotamia combined, has left us only several hundreds of skeletons, even when men sometimes had the benefit of burial which horses did not have. The cave paintings in Bhimbetka near Bhopal, perhaps 30,000 years old showing a horse being caught by humans, confirm that horses existed in India in spite of the paucity of skeletal remains. Other cave paintings, so far undated, show a number of warriors wielding sticks in their right hands and actually riding horses without saddles or bridles. The Dravidian language families have their own words for horse, Old Tamil ivuLi for wild horse and kutirai for domesticated horse and not borrowed from the language of the Aryans also indicates that horse was very much a known animal in the sub-continent. Partly because of the uncongenial climate, horses must have been comparatively rare in India compred to central asia but they were available. And then thequestion arises a to why the horse an animal which was central to all aryan cultures was not show on the seals of IVC, then for that it may be pointed out that the cows were also not shown on the seals despite cows being very much known to the harappans as the bull was a common motif on the seals. There may have been some taboo on the depiction of the two most scared animals on the seals much like the Islamic taboo on depicting holy people in pictures. First, one should note that horses and chariots were introduced into Egypt, China and Sumer it was not accompanied by a radical change of culture, language or population for an entire subcontinent as has been proposed for ancient India. Horseand cahriots are surely an advance but they arenot great of an advance that they are able to completely override all the other advanatges that another people may have. Ancient Egypt and China took on horses and chariots without any break in the continuity of their civilizations. Certainly, ancient India, the largest urban civilization of its time in the world, could have taken on a new horse/chariot culture without having to change everything else as well. Therefore, even if horses or chariots came into India from the outside at some point in time, this is no reason to assume that the language and culture of the region had to change as well. Second, a study of horse anatomy shows that there were two types of horses in the ancient world that we still find today. There is a south Asian and Arabian type that has seventeen ribs and a West and Central Asian horse that has usually eighteen ribs adn some times 34 and 38 ribs. The Rig Vedic horse, as described in the Ashvamedha or horse-sacrifice of the Rig Veda has thirty-four ribs (seventeen times two for the right and left side). In the Rig Veda, Book 1, Hymn CLXII verse 18 The four-and-thirty ribs of the. Swift Charger, kin to the Gods, the slayer's hatchet pierces. Cut ye with skill, so that the parts be flawless, and piece by piece declaring them dissect them. It is highly unlikely that the poet was describing something which was happening in front of his eyes as poets usually compose hymns while idle and through their imagination. And even if they describe something which took place then it usually is that they first witness the event and then later using their verbal imagination describe it in verse. So most probably the poet was not describing something which was taking place in front of his eyes much less that he acually counted the ribs of the horse which he mentioned in his hymn. In all likeliness the rib count which he gave was the number of ribs which the horse which they were familiar with commonly had which in this case is the native indian horse which had 34 ribs as opposed to the central asian variety which has 36 ribs in common cases. And chess pieces have been excavated from Lothal in IVC from 2500 B.C. One of these chess pieces is that of horse head obviously representing cavalry. This means that not only the horse was known to the IVC people but its use was so common in their armies that it had its own seperate division. So as we have seen here that the much toutd horse evidence is really not all that is made out to be and is not totally couNter conclusive to OIT. |
Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 15:41
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Un required explanation ...
Sorry Bilal have to be Blunt. People have already suggested you to discuss current relevant theories rather first bringing obsolete AIT and than saying See I told you it was wrong .
BTW You said that Prakrit was developed by a mix of Tamil and Sanskrit words.
Instead of wasting your time on lengthy posts why don't you first find out ,when even a little Dravidian (appox.10%Dravidian ) connection of Brahui was found out by Scholars ,why no body could find Tamil language in Parakrit of northern areas ,which you say is a mix of Sanskrit and Tamil ,most funny and a cornerstone of your hypothesis I have ever read.
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 15:49
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People for AMT says ,,,,Aryans were in Indus Valley ....In 1500 BC. FOR OIT argues much earlier date ,in both case they agree they were here by 1000 BC.
Can any body tell me How do they know that Aryan were here in 1000BC??
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Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 03:56
Bilal likes to use obsolete terms ( and ideas) like 'invasions' for AMT but he never used 'invasions' for his suggested migrations from India (OIT)
Unfortunately , There is still no evidence presented for his OIT . His ( very lenghty ) postings are full of innovative theories, though. Most theories are inspired by people that are not taken seriously ( in normal circles ). No wonder one gets strange info when inspired by people like Koenraad Elst ( as Bilal admitts he is ). Elst is from the same camp as David Frawley ( calling himself Guru Vamadeva Shastri and teaching Vedic magic , yoga and astrology !! ). Such authors ( often New Age people ) are usually found on sites with religious or India centric names like Voice of Dharma , Bharatvani ( Koenraad Elst' site ). Most views of them are not taken seriously. Same counts for people like Jha and Rajaram with their 'decipherements' of the IVC script. ( btw Bilal claimed to have made big progress , after 3 days of 'deciphering') IVC )
Bilal, those theories crumble everywhere. And often many things are misrepresented. There are no domestic horses found in Indusvalley times. The info you present is distorted. Why dont you show us an offiial conclusion about this , reached by a wide and modern consensus of scholars? (No seals presented by Rajaram please!! )
'Your' theory about OIT is simply not credible. If so, we would see the dravidian and munda substratum in the other IE languages. And, if you suggest certain IE groups leaving India to europe etc , please adress them by their common (acadamic ) name , proto language and material culture, so we can see check if there is a trail going back to India. Right now , your groups who left India around 4500 BC seem to be non existing. Nobody in scholarly field ( always meaning normal of course )knows about which groups you are talking!
Look, we dont need innovative theories/ ad hoc theories made up to to fit a view .We need theories based on EVIDENCE .
As anybody knows, the greatest linguitic diversity in IE is far outside India , making India already a bad candidate for the 'homeland' of IE languages. Also, the other IE langugaes dont show the substratum from the non IE Indian langauges, which Indo Aryan has. In regard to material culture. The Indo-Iranians can be reckonized by the domesticated horses and chariots and this is first attested in the southern Russian /Central Asian steppes . This trail goes to India , not viceversa. So linguistics and archeology does not favour a move from India but a move to it.
About Non- IA names. There are certainly non IA place names, Ganga ( Ganges ) and Kosola beeing 2 of them . More important , many local plants and animals are non- IA in the rig veda. In other words, a very strange situation for people who lived all their time in India!
No sensible scholar suggests a 4500 BC date for the Rig Veda. there dozens of reasons. To mention one . in 4500 BC India there were not even Aryan bronze/metal weapons and horse chariots , while the rig veda is full of them! Regarding the latter, a 5 th millium BC Rig Veda would have them 2500 years before they were invented
 Such dates and theories are not to be taken seriously. Most of what we see here seems unscientific and distorted, influenced by excessive india centric nationalism.
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 06:14
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 06:36
Looks you know very well the internal dimensions of this fake drama.
All these sites along with some like India Discussion Forum some how wants to prove nativity of Vedic faith and religion despite all evidences suggesting a contrary picture .Some of their logic are so weired to merit a discussion and one of that was a recent by Bilal that Prakrit was a mixture of Tamil and Sanskrit started by Moriyas.
Any way Sander Both OIT and AMT had some valid points .Point is Scholars have not propounded a theory based on those real evidences.
BTW I asked a question ,How do one know that Aryans were here in 1000BC?
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 09:05
| I am very busy right now I would respond to both of you very soon. |
Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 18:53
Yep , defending an OIT scenario seems be a motivation for many hindutvadis.
Well, the date of arrival and the date of the composition of the rig veda ( and which parts ) are different things. Its quite sure that the arrival happened way before 1000 BC though . The younger ( by text and language ) Yajur and Atharva veda mentions black iron ( archeologically attested circa 1100-1000 BC ) but the older rigveda does not know it. Also, the Gandhara Grave cullture ( beginning c. 1500 BC Pakistan ) is showing signs of Indo Aryan culture with its horse burials. |
Posted By: sreenivasarao s
Date Posted: 23-Nov-2007 at 16:37
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AIT
I am surprised AIT is still being discussed
seriously
1.Aryan:
The question of race, particularly the Aryan race is a messy one.
It is one of those famous “False problems”. Let us start from the
other end and clear the deck.
Aryan is an English word derived from the Vedic Sanskrit and
Iranian Avestan terms ari-, arya-, arya-, and it’s another form aryana. The
Sanskrit and Old Persian languages both pronounced the word as arya. The term
came widely into use (misuse) early in 19th century. How it came to
be developed and later how the British and others hijacked it is an interesting
story.
Aryan theory was, initially, developed by Danish and
Germanscholars of the romanticism era, like R. Rask and F. Bopp (1816) . The
German linguists such as the Leipzig Junggrammatiker school members further
developed it. The theoryof an immigration into or invasion of South Asia
byspeakers of Indo Aryan language based on the familiar concept of the Hunnic
and Germanic invasions of the Roman empire, emerged late in the 19th century.
The British latched on to the theory of an invasion by
superiorIndo Aryan speaking Āryas (‘‘Aryan invasion theory’’) as a means to
justify British policy and their own intrusion into India and their subsequent
colonial rule. In both cases (Hunnic/Germanic and British), a 'white race' was
subduing the local darker-colored population.
Further, the British also employed it, as a tool of their “divide
and rule” policy, to drive a wedge between the various groups in the Indian
people, by propagating that theAryan invaders from Central Asia destroyed the
native civilization and enslaved the native population. The strategy was to set
one class / region against another and let them fight it out. The then Viceroy
of India Lord Curzon called this policy “furniture of the Empire.” Sir Winston
Churchill opposed any policy tending towards decolonization on the ground: “We
have as much right to be in India as anyone there, except perhaps for the
Depressed Classes who are the native stock”. The British trick/strategy did
work and many groups within India supported the British on both the counts and
stated quarrelling among themselves. Since then the debate on the racial
character of the term “Aryan” gathered pace and chugged along.
During the early thirties, the “Aryan” found unexpected supporters
in the form of Nazis who employed it as a racial term designating the purest
segment of the White race. Nazis put the theory into a highly destructive
operation . The holocaust that followed is rather too well known to be
recounted here.
The Nazis pointed out to the British that Nazis were doing exactly
the thing they (British) themselves were doing in India, subjugating an
inferior race. Nazi schoolbooks included lessons on British rule in India .This
caught the British on wrong foot. British were embarrassed to find themselves
bracketed with Nazis. The British spin-doctors then came up with an explanation
that that the Indians were “brown Aryans” and there was no subjugation of
Indian people. The British thereafter soft peddled the Aryan theory and slowly
receded from it.
In the mean time, things came to a full circle in Persia. An off
shoot of this debate was that Persia woke up to its history and decided in
March 1935 to call itself Iran , derived from "arya" “āriyā “.We may
recall that Darius the Great, King of Persia (521-486 BC), , proclaimed:
"I amDarius the great King... A Persian, son of a Persian, an Aryan,
having Aryan lineage.”
Having re- discovered his roots the then Sha warmed up to his
newfound brethren, the other Aryans, the Nazis. The British were not amused
with this blossoming camaraderie and promptly snubbed Iran. Later in 1959, Iran
came up with a statement that names Iran and Persia could be used
interchangeably. However,since the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the official
name of the country is "Islamic Republic of Iran."
Because of its association with Nazi propaganda and the stigma
that stuck to it, the word “Aryan” is no longer in technical use. Presently,
white people go under the label Caucasian. Even in Linguistics, “Indo-European”
replaces Aryan.
Now, the infamous AIT – the Aryan Invasion theory stands largely
discarded. Let us leave it at that.
2. Race:
The term Arya, either in Sanskrit or Avesthan, has always meant
“noble”. Amara_Kosha, the Sanskrit lexicon, explains the term as “sabhya”
“sajjana” – meaning a gentleman. Arya is a term used by Hindus, Buddhists,
Jains and Parsis, to mean noble or spiritual.The Vedic Aryans called
themselvesArya in the Rig-Veda. Besides Iran, the Éire, the Irish name of
Ireland; and ehre (German for "honor") are related to the term Arya.
The Afghan airline is Aryana, named after the original name of that country.
Many children in Iran are named Iran-dokht, Aryan pour etc. based on the term
Arya. Similarly the South Indian names like, Ponna_iah, Subba_iah or Ayya_sami
etc. carry its cognate iah to assign respect to
the name. The term, obviously, is employed in the context of culture than race
In all these cases, the people of those countries, belonging to
various ethnic groups , preferred to associate with the term Arya to signify
that they were a noble and a respected people . There were no racial tags
attached to it.
Some say Rig-veda too does not employ the term in a racial sense. According
to Shrikant Talageri, among the tribes mentioned, most of whom of same race;
Rig Veda refers to Purus and especially to Bharathas as Aryans. It is,
therefore, a matter of regard and respect than of race.
I learn that in Manu Smrithi even Chinese were called Aryans. The
South Indian Kings called themselves Aryans and those of whom that established
kingdoms in South East Asia also called themselves Aryans.(to check)
Sri Aurobindo did not like the use of the term race in this
context. He said, ““I prefer not to use the term race, for race is a thing much more
difficult to determine than is usually imagined.”
According to Michel Wetzel, designation of a particular race to
people speaking a language is an aberration of the 19th and 20th century
Eva Nthoki Mwanika while commenting on the race of the Egyptian
people said, ”The Egyptians did not recognize "race" with in the same
context or definition in which modern society recognizes it and that, the
division of humankind into races as understood in the modern sense is a recent
phenomenon.” She went on to say, we are trying to impose a modern term “race”
on an ancient people who had a non-racial self-perception and a different
worldview.
I presume we can safely echo the views of Ms. Mwanika in the Aryan
context as well
Regards
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 27-Nov-2007 at 18:00
| i am back however it will take me some time to respond to the people here as my computer is busted |
Posted By: edgewaters
Date Posted: 30-Nov-2007 at 07:04
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OK, few things to understand about the historical proto-Indo-Europeans.
This group was not the Europeans coming in and conquering India. It was a group that dwelt between both regions and we don't really know if they were conquerors at all. The Indus Valley civilization collapsed around the same time as they arrived but it means nothing; it could be that there was an ecological catastrophe or weather change or something similar which caused both the collapse of the Indus cities and forced the PIEs to migrate, some into the subcontinent, some west to Europe. For all we know they arrived as peaceful refugees in both places. Second, the influx was probably not a large number of people in either region. The language they brought with them seems to have been very popular, but this doesn't at all indicate that they replaced or dislocated the original inhabitants, only that their language was adopted. Third, the PIEs aren't European any more than they were Indian. In both places there was definately pre-existant populations who, judging from genetic material, weren't impacted much by these newcomers. We don't really even know what they looked like or whether they were Caucasian, steppe peoples or what. We don't even know that they were a race or group of people at all, rather than just a material and linguistic culture that could have spread with very minimal movement of genetic material. What we do know, is that if there was genetic impact, it does not account much for present day genetic characteristics of populations in either region - whose genetic characteristics were, for the most part, formed during the Paleolithic and have changed remarkably little since. I don't know why Hindu nationalists get upset by this one. They should be no more affronted about it than Europeans are, since both were affected by the same phenomena in equal measure and in an equal fashion, whatever that was. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2007 at 11:32
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Mr Azat . It is a historical fact that the Brahmins were very unhappy with prakrit taking the place of Sanskrit as the official language who they considered vulgar as opposed to the refined sounds of Sanskrit. If there was no Sanskrit at the time or if Prakrit did not have official patronage then tell me what was that which they were so ruffeled about. And the Brahmins in the subcontinental culture were at the top of the chain and had authority over all the other castes, but which caste despite being subservient to them in theory but in reality had the power to overrule them. It was the warrior and kings class and which were the people of this class who were ruling the whole of the sub-continent, yes it was the Mauryans. The first evidence that which we have of Prakrit is fom the inscriptions of Ashoka in the Mauryans times before that the only record we have of any language was Sanskrit. You seem to be under the impression that Prakirt actually pre-dated Sanskrit. Well for all we know Sanskrit has been the language of the Aryan civilization in the sub-continent since they came into the sub-continent since they arrived there (by the AIT) that is why many invasionist say that Sanskrit was brought to the sub-continent by the Aryans and that the Rig Veda was composed outside of the sub-continent. They make no such claim about Prakrit, why is that? Because Prakrit came on the scene much later and hence there was no need to make the claim that it orginated out of the sub-continent to prove an outside origin of the Aryans. And Sanskrit has survived in its almost original form to us because because it was the language of the intellectuals and therefore was preserved by the intellegencia. While no such attempt was made to preserve Prakrit (assuming that it was actually also present at the time side by side with Sanskrit) and yet without any effort to preserve it, it survived in its purest form for about about 2000 years. Great logic man. As i said that the first time that which we have record of Prakrit was in the Ashoka's pillars which pretty strongly indicated that the language had state patronage in Ashokan times and it fell out of use as the language of insription not much later after the fall of the Mauryan empire in about 100 A.D and which language then took it place, yes it was Sanskrit. Also Prakarit in Sanskrit doesn't mean natural but also "vulgar", common, ordinary and usual. You are of the opinion that Prakrit and was a completely seperate development from Sanskrit. Well you will be surprised to know that most scholars think differently. You said "Prakrit just evolved in to modern languages ...Sanskrit language comes no where in between .neither in the beginning neither at the end." "when even a little Dravidian (appox.10%Dravidian ) connection of Brahui was found out by Scholars ,why no body could find Tamil language in Parakrit of northern areas" -Link- http://www.friesian.com/cognates.htm -Excerpt- "Prakrits," from Prâkr.ta, "natural," "ordinary," "common," "vulgar." Just like when latin was spoken by non-Romans it vulgarized into Spanish, French, Portugese and Italian similarly the vulgrarization of Sanskrit with the Dravidian languages (Tamil, Tulu whatever) produced the Prakrit languages. -Link- http://nostalgia.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prakrit -Excerpt- We might say that the Prakrits are to Sanskrit as Vulgar Latin and the Romance languages are to Classical Latin -Link- http://www.hindu.com/2007/09/13/stories/2007091350320200.htm -Excerpt- Tamil has words from Prakrit, which is a spoken form of Sanskrit. Just as vulgarization of Latin produced quite a few languages so also did the vulgarization of Sanskrit produced quite a few languages collectively called Prakrits which after an intermediatery stage became the languages of the north. -Link- http://www.tamil.net/list/1999-10/msg00015.html -Excerpt-People spoke only > > Prakrit, which was a mixture of Tamil and Sanskrit. And as i also said that most of the languages of the northern subcontinent are heavily Dravidized because they have evolved from Prakrit, which was one thing that which we agreed on. So there is your answer. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2007 at 13:11
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-But there was no invasion but a migration- Ever since the idea came about that the Aryan languages were introduced in India the word used for the movement of the Aryan people with their languages had always been "invasion'. It is only in the past couple of decades that with the extensive excavation of the Indus Valley sites which show absolutely no signs of any conflict (not even any internal one let alone an external one) that this term migration has been introduced in this discourse. But as many people have pointed out that you cannot have a migration with the result of an invasion. We identy things with the effect that which they have and not on the exact nature of those things. For example a hammer made of wood and a hammer made of iron both are called Hammer because their function and their effects are the same. A wooden hammer is usually thought to be more similar to a steel one than it is to a chair made of wood. Why? Because even though in its constitution it is more similar to a chair made of wood however in its function it is more similar to a hammer made of steel. That is why a hammer made of wood and a hammer made of steel are both called hammer rather than calling a wooden hammer a "chair" because its constituents are more similar to chair. An ancient army is considered anlalogus to todays army despite the nature of their arnaments being completely different. A modern military helicopter is far more similar to a modern civilian helicopter than it is to any ancient military arnament yet when it is used militarily the agency that uses it becomes an Army similar to an ancient army despite the fact that the helicopter is acually mr similar to modern civilian equipment than it is to any ancient arnament yet the agency that uses it in that context is more similar to the ancient army than it is to any civilian helicopter ambulance because of its use and the result it produces which is to bring down the opposition in the battle field. Threfore i will call a spade a spade and call an invasion an invasion which to me from all aspects looks like an invasion. And whats more this invasion was actually the invasioniest of invasions. Everybody calls the mongol incursions of the 13th century as invasions despite them being assimilated into almost every population that they conquered. Simlarly every one calls Hun incursions into the subcontinent invasions even though they were assimilated into the local population. However here we have an intrusive people who despite being much smaller in number not only imposed their language on the local population but also their culture (the vedic cannon has the pan IE culture in its most complete form) and yet we are not allowed to call them as invaders. In the saem vein i consider the Mittani and the Hittite incursions into mesopotamia as invasions, even though in the end they got assimilated among the native population. Similarly i also consider Iranian incursions into Iran proper as invasions even though their initial relations with the elamites may have been peaceful as can be gaged from the fact the Elamite language for a time was the official language of the Persian Empire. And i am interested that exactly which which consequence of the Aryan Invasion do you distance yourself from. Do you no longer support the claim that the caste system was imposed by the invading Aryans to preserve their racial distinctiveness. Do you also no longer support the claim that the enemies of the Aryans in the Rig Veda were the aboriginals of the sub-continent (dark skinned or white skinned). Do you also no longer support the claim that the natives of the sub-continent were pushed to the south by the incoming aryans. Do you also no longer support the claim that the battle between the forces of lightness and darkness that which we find chorincled in the rig veda do not actually represent the battle between the light skinned aryans and the dark skinned natives. All of these in the past were presented as proof for the aryan invasion in support of the very shaky and conjectural linguitic evidence. If you no longer support such claims then you are effectively shutting off all doors for proof of the Aryan Incursions outside of the extremely sketchy linguistic evidence. Mr Sanders said "Bilal likes to use obsolete terms ( and ideas) like 'invasions' for AMT but he never used 'invasions' for his suggested migrations from India (OIT)" That just shows how carefully you have read my posts. I have used the word "invasion" every time i talked about the European incursions because thats what they were invaders. When they were moving out of the subcontinent they were migrators because at that time they had no idea that where the future might lead them however when they moved into Europe they became invaders When the group which was to take over Europe was moving out of the sub-continent i used the word migration "And the European migrations may have taken place just a little bit earlier" "when most of the European and Iranian migrations would have taken place" When they moved into Europe i used the word invasion because thats what they were "I think that the European invasions may have taken place earlier" "And also the European invasions must have taken place from the punjab which is right at the opposite end of the sub-continent from where these groups would have entered." The only reason that which i see that invasion has been tunrned to migration is to alleviate the buren of proof on the AIT. But even if it was a migration then it should still have some evidence of such a migration. Any development which cannot be explained by local evolution, any signs of the coming of a foreign culture or a foreign people. Yet there is no such change at the specified time all we have is a gradual change from the culture of the Indus Valley Civilization to the later local cultures. The Grey Ware Culture claimed at one time to be the culture of the incoming aryans is now thought to be a native one. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2007 at 13:30
In my "headway on the IVC" thread i said that i had not read any decipherment attempts including Rajaram's attempt. I said "As per the question i am going through the task with absolute no preformed conceptions and have absolutely made no reading of any of the decipherment claims of the past because i wanted to tackle this problem with a fresh mind" However i also said in "Urgent Help Needed" "i had only read Asko Parpola work (which i do not consider to be a serious attempt at decipherment because of its sketchy nature) not all the attempts at decipherment" Since his reading of the text is Dravidian i am sure that you would not mind if i presented his interpretation o of the seals. However even if i wanted to i could not give the interpretation of even a single seal because helike all other Dravidian readers of the text despite decades of research was not able to give satisfactory reading for even a single line of seal text.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2007 at 13:48
My point remains how many. Less than even 2%. And most of it is along the coastal areas of Gujrat, Sindh and Marathi where the Dravidians being master sailors they were contacted the local populations. Compare that with more than 70 % of all the old place names in America being of Native American source. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2007 at 19:03
Please tell me what are those. Almost all the purely native flaura and fauna has IE etymologies. mayUra-peacock vyAghra-tiger mahiSa-buffalo monkey- kapi elephant-ibha, hastin, vAraNa, gaja, prshati- spotted deer |
Posted By: jdalton
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2007 at 20:47
I can't believe I'm wading into this, but...
This is a very good point and arguments of this kind have modified my views on Indian history. There are many ways a language can spread. Here are the ones I can think of, at least: 1.) Invasion and replacement of an existing population. Think the prevalence of English in North America. But if there's no evidence of a massive invasion into India, we can't really assume this happened. Especially considering the IAs were nomadic herders and the existing population were farmers living in one of the most fertile places in the world. I'm sure the IAs would have been vastly outnumbered! 2.) Invasion and conquest, the new language is imposed on the subjugated population. Think Spanish in South America. But without large powerful governments and armies to impose this language I don't know if the IAs could have done it. 3.) A language spreads along with a religion. Look at how popular Arabic is in North Africa. It took a small core of Arabic-speaking Muslims to spread their language across the region, but it has completely replaced Egyptian and Berber and Carthaginian because the existing population all switched to the new language when they switched religions. Here's my current favourite as regards the topic in question: 4.) A newly introduced language becomes a Lingua Franca when trade and travel suddenly become more common. Swahili is indigenous to a small part of the east coast of Africa. It spread all up and down that coast with the people as they travelled and traded and settled. But now it is becoming common in parts of Africa the Swahili themselves never reached. I've met people from Congo who speak it fluently. Why would this happen? Because Africa has hundreds and hundreds of small local languages and as soon as you leave your village you need a new way to communicate. And in the last few centuries Africans have been traveling around a whole lot more. Does anyone know how linguistically diverse the Sub-continent was before the assumed arrival date of the Indo-Aryans? If a smallish group of them arrived, were nomadic, and also introduced the horse, could their single unified language have suddenly seemed very useful to the native Indians when they traveled between regions? ------------- http://www.jonathondalton.com/mycomics.html - Lords of Death and Life (a Mesoamerican webcomic) |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 09-Dec-2007 at 17:02
That is why most people now use the term migration instead of invasion even though it is still pretty much an invasion. Not only were they living in the world's most fertile place but it also was the world's most extensive fertile expanse. The fertile expanse was much larger than it is today because the largest river to flow in this region flowed from north to south. When the thar desert and balochistan was lush green.
Again that would require large scale invasion of which there is no evidence.
That was followed by a noricable changr in the culture of that region. Of which there is no evidence here. The Indus Valley gradually and smoothly gave way to localized cultures.
Why would the Indus Valley people trade with the Aryans if the Aryans were if what they are made out to be by the AIT theory. They had everything that they could possibly want right in their midst. Metallic Ores, precious metals (this region was the only supplier of diamonds in the world as late as 1850), extensive fertile plains whose production must have been many times the combined output of Sumer and Egypt. Their trade with Sumer seems to have been only one way with nothing that was produced in Sumer being found in the Indus Valley, so the question arises that what possibly could the Aryans have which the Indus people wanted so that the Aryans could trade with them. Nomads cannot produce anything which the settled societies want because the act of production requires exploiting the natural sources something which nomads because of their constant moving cannot do.
As has already been pointed out that the introduction of horse in China, Egypt and Sumer wasn't accompanied by a complete change in their societies. Why should the Indus Valley be any different.
And secondly Indus Valley Civilization was as unified as any political entity can be in those times. At its most extreme the expanse of this civilization was 2.5 million square kilometer. And in all of this vast area there is no sign of any warfare, the same building standards were followed everyhwere, the same script was used everywhere. They certainly were not in need of the tribal aryans to show them the virtues of unity.
And about language diversity. When even that is not known that what language they spoke how can anybody decide about linguistic diversity of that time.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 09-Dec-2007 at 19:35
I am giving arguments that why i believe in something. What else should i do, say that OIt is true and whoever does not believe in it "is a fool" or in the case of pro-AIT people including you "is poltically motivated"
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 09-Dec-2007 at 19:42
Errr, this is a discussion thread isn't it. My point in starting this thread was to discuss the available evidence and decide for ourselves about AIT or AMT or OIT. What will be the point of this thread if we just accepted the commonly held view. There was afterall a time when most people thought that the earth was falt.
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Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 11-Dec-2007 at 01:38
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MayUra (peacock ) for example is Non IA, just as lANgala ( plough ) and vrIhi ( rice ). Anyway, for details on the non IA words in rigveda and IA , check F. B. J. Kuiper (Aryans in the Rigveda, 1991 ) or F. Southworth.
Much better to rely on specialists instead of dubious people like Koenraad Elst ( as you admitt you get much info from him ) , David Frawley ( a yoga teacher calling himself guru Vamadeva shastri ) Rajaram ( ' I see a horse ! '), Jha, Talageri, Oak ( " Taj Mahal and Mecca were Hindu !" ) etc etc.
Bilal, you asserted Prakrit was created by the Mauryas. We still see lenghty postings to defend that. Maybe the long reasoning in it works for you but that does not mean that counts for others.
Again, we dont get evidence supporting the OIT, only ad hoc theories and personal reasoning. No sensible person supports those ideas of a 6500 year old rigveda that has things only invented 2500 years later (!). Also, we cannot work with your theorioes of groups that left India in 4500 BC if you cannot even supply the names for them , their language, culture.
we clearly see where thse ideas are coming from : the hindu(tva) orientated sites like Bharatvani , the Hindu net , Voice of Dharma etc. Fortunately you dont make a secret of it but that does not mean that such kind of info is valid for others.
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Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 11-Dec-2007 at 01:57
exactly. Nobody in west europa gets insecure wether IE homeland is in europe or outside . Prevailing view is southern Russia, but so what? If the evidence shows Africa we will accept this too.
In India , though, people seem to be very much against the idea about the IE migration to that place. And this while for thousands of years wave after wave of people are coming to that place .
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 11-Dec-2007 at 04:33
Can you share how many waves of people do think there were who came.
How many migrated, invaded, just lost their way etc...?
Of those who decided to stay, where are they now? Assimilated or maintain seperate identity?
How many came and said 'nah... not for me' and went back?
Lastly, which regions do you count as India, present India? Pakistan also? Afghanistan too?
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 25-Dec-2007 at 15:23
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Ok i don't like to repeat myself but for once for your sake i will do so. I will give my sources for the facts that which i quoted Even supporters of the AIT have admitted that the horse was known in Mohenjo Daro, near the coast of the Arabian Sea (let alone in more northerly areas), in 2500 BC at the latest -Source- E.J.H. Mackay and A.D. Pusalker, quoted in Talageri: Aryan Invasion Theory, a Reappraisal But the presence of horses and even domesticated horses has already been traced further back: horse teeth at Amri, on the Indus near Mohenjo Daro, and at Rana Ghundai on the Panjab-Baluchistan border have been dated to about 3,600 BC -Source- Cited in Harry H. Hicks & Robert N. Anderson: Analysis of an Indo-European Vedic Aryan Head, 4th Millennium BC, Journal of Indo-European Studies, fall 1990, p.425-446, specifically p.437
More bones of the true and domesticated horse have been found in Harappa, Surkotada (all layers including the earliest), Kalibangan, Malvan and Ropar
-Source- S.P. Gupta: The Lost Sarasvati and the Indus Civilization, p. 193-196, with full references Recently, bones which were first taken to belong to onager specimens, have been identified as belonging to the, domesticated horse (Kuntasi, near the Gujarat coast, dated to 2300 BC). Superintending archaeologist Dr. A.M. Chitalwala comments: We may have to ask whether the Aryans () could have been Harappans themselves. () We dont have to believe in the imports theory anymore -Source- Interviewed in: Aryan civilization may become bone of contention, Indian Express, 10/12/1995.
Other cave paintings, so far undated, show a number of warriors wielding sticks in their right hands and actually riding horses without saddles or bridles -Source- Dated to la nuit des temps, the night of time, in Science Illustrée, May 1995 http://www.geocities.com/bilal_ali_2000/IndusValleyChessPieces.jpg Here are the Terracotta chess pieces excavated from Lothal from 2500 B.C. You tell me that what does the horse piece among those pieces mean? http://www.geocities.com/ifihhome/images/bbl002/lothalhorse.jpg This horse figurine was excavated from Lothal http://www.geocities.com/bilal_ali_2000/HorseMohenjodaro.jpg This one was excavated from Mohenjodaro I had to go to the trouble of hosting these picture on the web to appease you -Link- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surkotada -Excerpts- Surkotada is an archeological site located in India. It is famous for horse remains dated to ca. 2000 BCE [1][2 References B?k?nyi, S. Horse Remains from the Prehistoric Site of Surkodata, Kutch, late 3rd Millennium B.C. South Asian, Studies,1997 Meadow, R. H. and Patel, A. A Comment on "Horse Remains from Surkodata" by S?ndor B?k?nyi. South Asian, Studies 13, 1997, 308-318
"Deep in the specialized literature on horse classification, we can find that Indian and other horses extending to insular Southeast Asia were peculiar from other breed. All showed anatomical traces of admixture with the ancient equid known as Equus Sivalensis. …However, like that equid, the horse of southeastern Asia has peculiar zebra-like dentition. Also both were distinguished by a pre-orbital depression. The orbital region is important because it has been demonstrated as useful in classifying different species of equids. Finally, and most importantly in relation to the Vedic literature, the Indian horse has, like Equus Sivalensis, only 17 pairs of ribs." ( P K Manansala). -Source- A. Ghosh’s respected and authoritative Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology mentions In India the ... true horse is reported from the Neolithic levels at Kodekal [dist. Gulbarga of Karnataka] and Hallur [dist. Raichur of Karnataka] and the late Harappa levels at Mohenjo-daro (Sewell and Guha, 1931) and Ropar and at Harappa, Lothal and numerous other sites. … Recently bones of Equus caballus have also been reported from the proto-Harappa site of Malvan in Gujarat.1 I had given you the exact source which says that the horse with which the Rig Vedic aryans were familiar with was the 17 ribbed horse
In the Rig Veda, Book 1, Hymn CLXII verse 18 Mortimer Wheeler otherwise an invasionist said “it is likely enough that camel, horse and ass were in fact a familiar feature of the Indus caravan.” -Source- Mortimer Wheeler, The Indus Civilization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1953), p. 92, quoted by Edwin Bryant in The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture: The Indo-Aryan Migration Debate (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 170-171. The well- known archaeologist B. B. Lal refers to a number of horse teeth and bones reported from Kalibangan, Ropar, Malvan and Lothal -Source- B. B. Lal, The Earliest Civilization of South Asia (New Delhi: Aryan Books International, 1997), p. 162. Another senior archaeologist, S. P. Gupta, adds further details on those finds, including early ones -Source- S. P. Gupta, The Indus-Sarasvati Civilization – Origins, Problems and Issues (Delhi: Pratibha Prakashan, 1996), pp. 160-161. In the case of Lothal, the archaeozoologist Bhola Nath certified the identification of a tooth -Source- Quoted in S. R. Rao, Lothal – A Harappan Port Town (New Delhi: Archaeological Survey of India, 1985), vol. II, pp. 641-642. he also made similar observations regarding bones from Mohenjo-daro and Harappa -Source- For Harappa, see Bhola Nath, “Remains of the Horse and the Indian Elephant from the Prehistoric Site of Harappa (West Pakistan)” in Proceedings of the All-India Congress of Zoology (Calcutta: Zoological Society of India, 1961). See also Bhola Nath, “Advances in the Study of Prehistoric and Ancient Animal Remains in India – A Review” in Records of the Zoological Survey of India, LXI.1-2, 1963, pp. 1-64.
A. K. Sharma’s identification of horse remains at Surkotada was endorsed by the late Hungarian archaeozoologist Sándor Bökönyi, an internationally respected authority in the field; in 1991, taking care to distinguish them from those of the local wild ass (khur), he confirmed several of them to be “remnants of true horses,” and what is more, domesticated horses
-Source- Sándor Bökönyi, “Horse Remains from the Prehistoric Site of Surkotada, Kutch, Late 3rd
In his 1993 report to the Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India, Bökönyi made no bones about the whole issue: Through a thorough study of the equid remains of the prehistoric settlement of Surkotada, Kutch, excavated under the direction of Dr. J. P. Joshi, I can state the following: The occurrence of true horse (Equus caballus L.) was evidenced by the enamel pattern of the upper and lower cheek and teeth and by the size and form of incisors and phalanges (toe bones). Since no wild horses lived in India in post-Pleistocene times, the domestic nature of the Surkotada horses is undoubtful. This is also supported by an inter- maxilla fragment whose incisor tooth shows clear signs of crib biting, a bad habit only existing among domestic horses which are not extensively used for war -Source- Sándor Bökönyi, 13 December 1993, in his report to the Director General of the P. K. Thomas, P. P. Joglekar et al., experts from the Deccan College on faunal remains, reported horse bones from the nearby Harappan site of Shikarpur “in the Mature Harappan period,”9 and from Kuntasi (at the boundary between Kutch and Saurashtra).
-Source- P. K. Thomas, P. P. Joglekar, et al, “Subsistence Based on Animals in the Harappan Culture Koldihwa (in the Belan valley of Allahabad district), G. R. Sharma et al. identified horse fossils -Source- G. R. Sharma, History to Prehistory: Archaeology of the Vindhyas and the Ganga Valley Contemporary with the Harappan period, the culture of the Chambal valley (in Madhya Pradesh) was explored by the respected archaeologist M. K. Dhavalikar, with layers dated between 2450 and 2000 BCE. -Source- M. K. Dhavalikar, Indian Protohistory (New Delhi: Books & Books, 1997), p. 115.
Just like at Surkotada, the horse at Kayatha was domesticated
At Surkotada from all the three periods quite a good number of bones of horse (Equus Caballus Linn) ... have been recovered. The parts recovered are very distinctive bones: first, second and third phalanges and few vertebrae fragments -Source- Ibid., p. 381. -Source- The first of Surkotada’s “three periods” coincides with the mature stage of the Harappan civilization
-Source- Period IA starts about 2300 BCE (see ibid., p. 60 ff.), but this is based on uncalibrated C-14 we have the case of Mahagara (near Allahabad), where horse bones were not only identified by G. R. Sharma et al., but “six sample absolute carbon 14 tests have given dates ranging from 2265 B.C.E. to 1480 B.C.E.” -Source- Sharma et al., Beginnings of Agriculture (Allahabad: Abinash Prakashan, 1980), pp. 220-
The case of Hallur, mentioned by A. Ghosh above, is even more striking: the excavation (in the late 1960s) brought out horse remains that were dated between 1500 and 1300 BCE, in other words, about the time Aryans are pictured to have galloped down the Khyber pass, some 2,000 north of Hallur -Source- K. R. Alur, “Animal Remains” in Proto-historical Cultures of the Tungabhadra Valley, ed. M. S. Which which of these reports will you deny? And the evidence is bound to pile up as thousands of the Harppans sites are excavated. |
Posted By: anum
Date Posted: 25-Dec-2007 at 18:12
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aryans probably came till modern day kashmir, punjab area. No way they conqured half of india as it is suggested by many indians. There home land was present day Afghanistan/Centeral asia area. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 25-Dec-2007 at 18:56
If they didn't conquered North India then please tell me that how is north india aryan today.
As for Aryans originating in Afghanistan, well that is a pretty strange proposition. The harappan realm covered most of what is Afghanistan today. If the Harappans themselves were not Aryans then please tell me that how come is that Afghanistan suddenly became Aryans despite being under the Harappans.
Apart from the Harappans there is very little evidence of any advanced culture able to make the Aryan incursions possible. The two candidates that we have for the homeland of the Aryans now are southern Russia and Anatolia and in both of them have cultures which we can attribute to Aryans, Antolia has many neolithic cultures whereas southern russia has the kurgan culture. Where do we find such a non-harappan culture in Afghanistan.
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Posted By: anum
Date Posted: 25-Dec-2007 at 19:55
| North indian speak aryan languages, that doesnt mean they are aryans. also afghanistan was always connected with central asia, orginally aryans were from central asia region. |
Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 31-Dec-2007 at 03:19
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Posted By: Sander
Date Posted: 31-Dec-2007 at 03:58
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What s new here ? Again a pro- hindutva selected list with many refernces to dubious Indian scholars ( most of the hindutva camp). As checked, much is to be read on the hindutva sites like Bharatvani , Hindu- unity, Voice of Dharma etc .
We even see Talageri ( see earlier postings ) mentioned on Bilals list. Talageri who claimed to have published the most important work on the rigveda ever, revealing all its socalled secrets ( India as imaginary origin of the iranic , greek , germanic, slavic people etc etc )while he cannot even read the vedic text himself and employs 19 th century English translations.
Its also interesting to see indians like Gupta , Kak, Sethna ( and many more) on it who greatly cheered when Rajaram and Jha pulled their horse tricks ( see further below). No coincedence that most of the listed indians (or pro Hindutva non -indians like Frawley , Knapp, Elst , Feuerstein etc ) are always to be read on the hindu sites.
The referring to Indian scholars/institutions has usually little value in these matters (as we shall see). That such Indian scholars on this (not meaning the exceptions) are not taken very seriously in the normal academic circles has nothing to do with prejudice or something, but is the result of their ongoing distortions and bizar India centric claims. In modern India people and institutions are often applauded (especially by the official Hindu nationalist parties) when they come up with distorted info ( and outright nonsense) , as long as the hindutva cause is served. That is also why the " Institute for Rewriting Indian history" , is enthousiastically claiming an Indian background for almost everything on earth.
When the 'indigenist' camp cites western scholars or studies they usually mean little. Often the cited study is invalid or is misused in creative ways by the nationalists for the ' good cause'. Lets give an example of this from Bilal list, that says it all ( done by B. Lal, the director -general of the Archeological Survey of India )
Sandor Bokonyi is mentioned and cited as support for the "indigenous domesticated horse" . Bokonyi is one of the few mentioned on the list that can be taken seriously. Yet, as expected , even here the 'indigenist 'camp is deliberately messing things up. Whatever Bokonyi might have said in 1993 ( in a informal letter to somebody )about a possibility that the domesticated horse might be indigenous, has little weight because in his 1997 scholarly paper he stresses that the domesticated horse is imported from central asia :
" horses reached the Indian subcontinent in an already domesticated form from the Inner Asiatic domestication centres". (Central Asian steppes). (also quoted in "Horseplay in Harappa" , see below).
Now, because the Indian nationalists prefers to say that Bokonyi supports some indigenous domesticated horse, they will cite his 1993 letter instead of his 1997 study where he emphasizes the import! A good example of their more subtle tactics. Sandor Bokonyi thought to have seen some horsebones of slightly earlier than 2000 BC but this had no consensus among specialists . Wether they are 2100 BC or rather 1800 BC is not even relevant since the subsequent scientific research on the bones, by Richard Meadow and Ajita Patel (1997 , "A comment on : Horse remains at Surkotada by Sandor Bokonyi " ) established they belonged to the equus hemionus khur , the onager.
  The onager ( guess where it's habitat and Surkotada are.. Hey, its the same place, Kutch )
It are usually zooarcheologists ( specialized in animal bones from archeological sites) that can distinguish best between the bones, something non specialists cannot. Fortunately, Richard Meadow ( Harvard University ) is already for more than a decade director of the Harappa Archeogical project in Pakistan and the team inclused zooarcheologists ( he himself is as well) No nonsensical 'horseplay ' from them and bona fide studies show that all clearly identified horsebones ( in undisturbed layers etc ) in the subcontinent are from the second millenium BC , the period of Aryan arrival.
As demonstrated, referenes, citations, pictures etc loose value ( if having any) after passing through the Indian Hindutva' channel '. Lets give 2 more examples for fun. As many know, Rajaram was greatly cheered by the Indian nationalists when he and Jha published their book with their totally nonsensical 'decipherment' of the IVC script and their ' discovery' of the IVC horse. Now, in their work there are some ( seemingly normal ) references to IVC seals, europeans scholars etc. Well, lets see how horses are 'produced ' :
  left : seal impression ( derived from Mackay 772 A )
middle and right : rajarams impressions of the seal and behold... the desired horse!
Ofcourse, the reality was different :
  left :front of the original seal ( mackay772 A )Simply a cracked seal
right : Indus seal with the standard unicorn bull
For quick and detailed reading on all this nonsense and more, see the legendary artcile , "Horseplay in Harappa" (M. Witzel and S. Farmer 2000 )
  Lets look at another 'horse vision' . Below a pic of a 'horse' presented by Bilal :
 Hard to see what it is actually (several animals, prey and predators, have heavy necks). Its does not even look remotely horse- like , with such skinny hips behind ( not to mention other things).
This is a horse :
 Horse in action
The head of Bilals ' horse' does not seem so striking either. It does not even have ears.
  horses in good mood ( with ears )
Of course, no sensible zoologist etc will ever suggest that Bilal's mammal is a horse, without rightfully fearing to be thrown out of his association with no chance of ever returning.
The above only deals with part of the dubious stuff that has been published here . Bilal has shown many more dubious references , citations and arguments, pics etc, always to be read on the Hindu sites. Occasionaly, some info from there is copied and finds its way to (seemingly) less alarming looking sites but it keeps just as suspect ofcourse. Usually, it can be easily traced back to the Hindutva/Indigenist camp and experience has thought us ( and still does) that it's nearly always distorted stuff to fool others. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 31-Dec-2007 at 04:24
you're confusing the terms aryan and indo-european. regardless of ur preference, the consensus among language experts is that Hittite is the oldest IE language, and anatolia very far from india again, OIT fails to address this. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 31-Dec-2007 at 04:34
where do you get these numbers from? ur implying the dravidian speakers never traveled inland, which is def not the case, considering some postulate dravidian speaking populations once stretched from Elam down to Sri Lanka, with the Brahui remanants presently in baluchistan. |
Posted By: jdalton
Date Posted: 02-Jan-2008 at 00:55
(Well, Indoeuropean, but anyways) Can we agree on this? Is this possible? The linguistic evidence is the evidence I know the best, and the linguistic evidence seems pretty conclusive. By which I mean, the linguistic evidence strongly suggests the people of Northern India speak languages that originated in Central Asia. If we can agree that A.) some group, however small or large, must have traveled from Central Asia to the Subcontinent and transmitted their language, and B.) that IE-speaking and Dravidian-speaking South Asians cannot be distinguished today apart from their language, It would seem to me to be a much more fruitful debate to ask "what was the nature of the so-called 'Aryan invasion.'" Was it an invasion at all? When did it happen? How long did it take? Was it a large group of people or a small group of people? What happened to these Aryans? Did they have any impact on the Subcontinent apart from language? That sort of thing. ------------- http://www.jonathondalton.com/mycomics.html - Lords of Death and Life (a Mesoamerican webcomic) |
Posted By: anum
Date Posted: 02-Jan-2008 at 01:33
| hi guys this is really interesting article and it clearly tells majority of indians have indian genetics not outsiders http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/01/0110_060110_india_genes.html - http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/01/0110_060110_india_genes.html |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 03-Jan-2008 at 16:59
The only reason that Hittite is being considered as the oldest of IE langauges because of the presence of laryngeal as well as loss of gender distinction as opposed to Sansskrits distinction between genders. As i said that Hittite is very different form all the other IE languages. It has shown a large intake of non IE elements. First about the loss of Gender differentiation. The loss of Gramatical gender is a common phenomenon in IE languages whio have been exposed to a large dose of foreign influence like English and Sanskrit and about the presence of laryngeal it has been hypothesized that the presence of laryngeal like other non IE features of Hittite is due to foreign influence of Semitic languages by many scholars and with the last one being Heinz Kronasser.
Actually the HIttie and the Mitanni of Mesopotamia and Aantoliais one of the prime arguments for OIT. The Mitanni spoke a language which was very close to Sanskrit had IA names and their language was mature Indo Aryan at a atime when it was supposed to have been proto Indo-Aryan. The hittite's language and religion although had many non-IE elements but in a peace treaty with the mitanni they took the names of Indo-Aryan Gods of Viruna, Mitra, Agni and Indra. The Kassites although non-Aryan in a text reverd indo-Aryan Gods. These facts tally perfectly with the OIT which outs the Hittite and the Mitanni as the people which settled in Mesopotamia after the drying up of Saraswati in the IVC.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 03-Jan-2008 at 17:10
Of course the Dravidian speakers travelled inland. It is impossible that indo-aryans and Dravidians would have been present side by side for centuries yet have no influence on each other. Most of the coastal areas of the sub-continent show dravidian imprint indicating pretty strongly that the Dravidians had strong contacts with the Indo-Aryans.
As for Bruhi i think that i have already explained that Bruhi was one of the groups present when the sepeartion between Aryans and Iranians took place and were pushed out from the sub-continent along with the other Aryan Dravidians.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 03-Jan-2008 at 17:16
I have dsuicussed this evidence before. The linguistic evidence is hardly conclusive and most linguistics trying to prove the AIt through linguistics end up saying that "But of course there is the well known archeological evidence for AIT". The linguistic evidence when viewed in light of all the other evidence is hardly conclusive. Look at my post on the linguistic evidence for a detailed explanation.
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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 04-Jan-2008 at 00:31
No, Hittite is the oldest attested IE language b/c of the many stone tablets of Hittite in cuneiform script found which pre-date any other IE language. The presence of laryngeals actually further supports language experts which predicted their presence in proto-IE before they were even discovered in Hititte: http://www.cs.indiana.edu/~port/teach/relg/PIE.html it was known that there were some troublesome words in Indo-European where the sound changes seemed not to be behaving in their usual regular way; things were happening to vowels and sometimes consonants in certain words that couldn't be explained based on what is found in the attested languages. Ferdinand de Saussure in the late 19th century suggested that there had to be a set of three segments usedin certain words in the proto-language that had not survived in any of the daughter languages. He was fairly conservative about claiming what phonetic content they must have had, but he called them laryngeals and pointed out the precise locations where they must have occurred in particular words. A few years later, when a bunch of texts in Turkey were finally decoded and shown to be a new I-E language of ancient Anatolia, Hittite, the oldest attested Indo-European language -- voila: there were the laryngeals, in exactly the words where Saussure had predicted they must be just on the basis of careful reconstruction.
all languages are influenced by neighbors, its natural. Just as large amount of Vedic Sanskrit's vocabularly is non-IE (primarily Dravidian and Munda), and it uses Dravidian retroflexes which are absent from all other IE languages.
not quite. In fact the earliest written evidence of an Indo-Aryan language is found in Syria, via Hittite treaty with their Hurrian speaking Mitanni neighbors. This follows suit well geographically with a parallel movement of IA speaking nomads out of Central Asia into India and Mesopotamia. "The possibility that a small group broke off and wandered from India into Western Asia is readily dismissed as an improbably long migration, again without the least bit of evidence." -J.P Mallory |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 04-Jan-2008 at 00:38
obviously, as seen by their influence on Vedic Sanskrit
this seems more like ur own personal theory.. aryan dravidians? 
anyways, point being Dravidian (or related) speaking peoples once inhabited a large area extending from elam to southern India (including inland areas) but were eventually assimilated in the northern areas, with the exception of the Brahui, who retained their original language. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 04-Jan-2008 at 00:49
The same can likely be said for all other "aryan" countries. Population genetics are pretty much same as they were back in neolithic period, except in cases of mass migrations such as europeans to north america. In all likelihood the aryans represented an elite-dominance group, which used their military might to impose their language and religion on much larger indigenous populations... similar to the Spanish in central and south america |
Posted By: ishwa
Date Posted: 05-Jan-2008 at 00:45
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We know that the Indo-Iranian culture appears from historical times where they are situated now. The Rgveda refers to the areas of the subcontinent.The specialists agree that the Avesta refers to an “East-Iranian” world, pointing as per G. Gnoli to a core area in central Afghanistan, with extensions to the direct adjoining north, south, west and east (upto Hapta Hendva in the Videvdat) areas. Avesta Yt. 10.13-14, where the whole region inhabited by the Iranian Airiia (airiio.shaiiana-) is described, consisted of Mount Hara and the districts of Ishkata and Peruta, Margiana and Areia, Gava, Sogdiana, and Chorasmia. The last two are E. Benveniste has demonstrated (BSOAS 7, 1933-35, pp. 269f.), in Medo-Iranian forms; this suggests that they were later additions (G. Gnoli, RSO 41, 1966, p. 68; idem, De Zoroastre aà Mani, p. 21). Gava, mentioned here with Sogdiana, doesn’t seem to be Suguda, but probably to Thatagush? So far, East-Iranian. What about West-Iranian: Old Persian -s- (as in < asa "horse") < *śś < śv is close to Saka -śś-. And we have also Median Iranian -sp- (aspa) but also in the Avesta. This may point to an eastern origin of OP and Median languages. In general there is absolutely no evidence of any migration (mass or small) of people from Trans-Central-Asia or Central-Asia into the subcontinent in either the 2nd (or 3rd millennium) BCE. This migration into the subcontinent is a major frustration for linguists. No major or minor breakthrough has been achieved in this respect, despite the level of hypotheses and critiques by linguists. The two most often launched theories, equally heavily criticized are the Anatolian (for instance Diakonoff) and Eurasian (for instance Mallory) homeland theories. BMAC does spread into E-Iran and upto Baluchistan, but it has no connection whatsoever with any development from the 2nd to the 1st millennia in both areas. Do consult C.C. Lamber-Karlovsky of Harvard, for instance in Archaeology and Language; The Indo-Iranians, CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY Volume 43, Number 1, February 2002. He summarizes: “Indo-Iranian is a linguistic construct with two branches, one of which went to Iran and the other to northern India. The time of their arrival in these new homelands is typically taken to be the 2d millennium B.C. Not a single artifact of Andronovo type has been identified in Iran or in northern India, but there is ample evidence for the presence of Bactrian Margiana materials on the Iranian Plateau and in Baluchistan (e.g., at Susa, Shahdad, Yahya, Khurab, Sibri, Miri Qalat, Deh Morasi Ghundai, Nousharo [for a review see Hiebert and Lamberg-Karlovky 1992]). It is impossible, however, to trace the continuity of these materials into the 1st millennium and relate them to the known cultures of Iranian-speakers the Medes or the Achaemenids (or their presumed Iron Age ancestors [see Ghirshman 1977, Young 1967]).” In an interesting "Afterword" to Sarianidi's Margiana and Protozoroastrianism, J. P. Mallory asks, "How do we reconcile deriving the Indo-Iranians from two regions [the steppes and the Central Asian oases] so different with respect to environment, subsistence and cultural behavior?" (1998a:181). He offers three models, each of interest, none supported by archaeological evidence, one of which is that the Bactrian Margiana complex was Indo-Iranian and came to dominate the steppe lands, serving as the inspiration for the emergence of fortified settlements such as Sintashta in the southern Urals. Thus, an external source is provided for the development of the "country of towns" and with it a linguistic affiliation. Mallory admits that this model is unlikely. His conclusion is that the nucleus of Indo-Iranian linguistic developments formed in the steppes and, through some form of symbiosis in Bactria-Margiana, pushed southward to form the ancient languages of Iran and India (p. 184). It is, however, that "form of symbiosis" that is so utterly elusive! Lamberg-Karlovsky hits the nail, when he remarks in the same article: “The identity of the Indo-Iranians remains elusive. When they are identified in the archaeological record it is by allegation rather than demonstration.” And then: ‘Linguists too often assign languages to archaeological cultures, while archaeologists are often too quick to assign their sherds a language. Denis Sinor (1999:396), a distinguished linguist and historian of Central Asia, takes a position that more might consider: "I find it impossible to attribute with any degree of certainty any given language to any given prehistoric civilization."’ [quote Kabob1122] all languages are influenced by neighbors, its natural. Just as large amount of Vedic Sanskrit's vocabularly is non-IE (primarily Dravidian and Munda), and it uses Dravidian retroflexes which are absent from all other IE languages. [/quote] Retroflexes are not a feature of Dravidian. They are even found in parts of other worlds (Hock 1986), such as in Scandinavia, Australia, Indonesia. I could even hear retroflex-like sounds in the Czech Republic and of a group of Croats (especially when they tried to speak in English).
There were no Dravidians in the NW, however we do meet these sounds within the Hindukush and Pamir languages (Nuristani/Kafiri, Burushaski, Dardic and Iranian Pamir languages: Wakhi, Yigdha, Sanglechi, Ishkashmi, Khotanese Saka; Parpola 1994: 166; Tikkanen). [quote Kabob1122] not quite. In fact the earliest written evidence of an Indo-Aryan language is found in Syria, via Hittite treaty with their Hurrian speaking Mitanni neighbors. The influence of IA in Syria is much exaggerated. Appearance of a few Hurrianized divine names doesn’t mean they were the gods of a dominant group. There were Arya speaking subjects in Mitanni, but we have to be cautious about finding IA names in Hurri names:
“It is often claimed that ”all” the names of the Mittani kings were Indo-Aryan, but this has never been proven. Manfred Mayrhofer, in the Gedenkschrift für Heinz Kronasser, INVESTIGATIONES PHILOLOGICAE ET COMPARATIVAE, Wiesbaden 1982, p. 79, confesses that ”Sicherlich machen Namen wie Sa-u$-sa-ta-at-tar (u. dgl.), Par/Pár/Ma$-sa-ta-tar einen strukturell arischen Eindruck, aber sie entbehren einer Deutung, die strengen Massstäben genügte.” It is not enough to state that a name ”structurally makes an Aryan impression”, it must be proven. Now, if we read SA as $A10, which seems to be possible on the background of Hurro-Akkadian texts from Qatna, there is no problem with interpreting $au$$a-Tattar (or even $au$-Tadar/Tattar) as Hurrian, since $au$a is the Hurrian I$tar, and the root tad- (here augmented with the –d/t- suffix, plus the iterative –ar) in my opinion gives us a very convincing Hurrian etymology. In the same way we can interpret ”Sausadat” as $au$a-Tad, again with a similar meaning: ”I$tar is Love”, or perhaps ”Love is I$tar”. The only irregular detail is the lack of the thematic nominalizing ending –i/e (one might expect –Tattare and –Tade), but this could be a dialect phenomenon, and there are several parallels from older stages of Hurrian, see Gernot Wilhelm’s Namengebung article in RlA.” (Bjarte Kaldholl ANE-2, Fri Apr 27, 2007) IA presence and influence can be seen around 15th/14th century. But kings like Artadama have two names, always having an earlier Hurri one too. Especially in connection with horses and chariots we see over-zealous interpretations. The Hurri (Khabur Valley horse culture) and Egyptian had their own ancient, indigenous origins. And what about the indigenous horse chariots of the Sahara? Originally, researchers believed that the Saharan chariots were introduced into the Sahara by Egyptians and/or the Peoples of the Sea. This hypothesis is now discredited because there are few similarities between the Saharan and Aegean portrayals of Chariots (Desanges, 1981,p.432). The horse period is dated between 1500-500 BC (Sahnouni, 1996, p.29). The horse depicted in the Sahara was not the Arabian horse typified by the Berber and Taurag horsemen. Barbary horses drew the Saharan chariots horses (Desanges, 1981, p.432). In sum, not every horse culture or chariot has to be IE or IIr. As we see intrusive elements of IA in Syria, it is not impossible that this was also the case in the steppes of Eurasia. We do not have any specimens of the Sintashta horse burials in the subcontinent. [quote Kabob1122] In all likelihood the aryans represented an elite-dominance group, which used their military might to impose their language and religion on much larger indigenous populations... similar to the Spanish in central and south america [/quote] We do have records and remains of Spanish movements in the Americas. Remember that there is no archaeological or genetic influx into Iran and India from Central-Asia (Lamberg-Karlovsky), so how can we trace “parallel movement of IA speaking nomads out of Central Asia into India and Mesopotamia”?
This points to the major linguistic frustration and a very problematic paradox: no trace of migrating people, but the language is ‘suddenly’ there. Despite trying to avoid “invasion” by using “migration” still we see appearances of words like “elite-dominance” and “military might” and “to impose their language and religion”.
Intrusive Brahui is from a late migration from the deeper subcontinent to the northern SW. Bh. Krishnamurti and J. Elfenbeim (chapter on Brahui that he wrote in Rutledge's The Dravidian Languages, edited by Sanford Steever) both agree that Brahuis moved from Central or East India westward around 800-1100 CE! Krishnamurti: “What is most crucial is *v- to b- which was an IA sound change of Eastern and Central lgs. By their location all three ND lgs got influenced by this areal sound change. This is one of the arguments that Brahui speakers moved to N-W from east India.”
Concluding remarks Bjarte Kadholl: “It is really an enigma how the old German idea of Aryan ”supremacy” in Mittani (and an Aryan origin of the Mittanian empire) has been able to survive for so long.” (Bjarte Kaldholl ANE-2, Fri Apr 27, 2007) This is not the only motive which survived from those days and previously. However, the discussion should always be on subject matter. That’s why it is wise not to judge people and brand them as “Hindutva” etc. just because those people disagree and question a migration theory into the subcontinent. The specialists agree there is no literary or material record of movement of people into the subcontinent. Neither are there traces of genetic movements. But there is no clear proof that Indo-Iranian people came from Central-Asia and that their culture and we do know the languages are there in their present places. Let further, fresh research decide how the components genetics, language, literature and culture relate to each other and to migrations. |
Posted By: ishwa
Date Posted: 05-Jan-2008 at 09:53
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A correction to the above: Proponents of the Anatolian homeland: Gamkrelidze and Ivanov. D'iakonoff is a proponent of a third theory: a Balkan homeland in SE Europe, debunking the Kurgan steppe theory of Gimbutas and the Anatolian theory of Gamkrelidze and Ivanov. The linguists do not agree Interestingly, D’íakonoff on the basis of for instance the Tell el-Amarna letters seems to think that the IE words or names in Mitanni Hurrian was not a living language, but only remnants of previous contacts that certain Hurrian groups had with eastern IE dialects elsewhere. (I. Diakonoff, "Die Arier im Vorderen Asien--Ende eines Mythos," Orientalia 41, 1972) This is interesting, IA as a dead language in the time of Hittites. Not only D’iakonoff, but also P. Mikhalowsky and others shared this view. They, with S, Kammerhuber ("Die Arier im Vorderen Asien, Heidelberg 1968) also looked critically at the word Mariannu (Marya being a loan from IA). They argue for an indigenous word, in Hurro-Urartian denoting simply a “chariot driver”. It has nothing to do with “aristocracy” as the ordering in for instance the Alalakh documents demonstrate. N. B. Jankowka also notes that the word is Hurro-Urartian, and adds, "Note also that the marianna were not a "feudal aristocracy"; they were palace personnel..." (Diakonoff, ed, Early Antiquity (Chicago, 1991) 244.) The 4 gods in the Mattiwaza Treaty happen to be found with a slight variance in the Xth Mandala of the Rgveda. That is the last book added to the Samhita or collection. While the “supposed dead” IA sequence in Mitanni give Nasatiia, the late Xth Mandala gives Ashvin. Hint to two different groups sharing a common heritage? |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 06-Jan-2008 at 20:41
the subcontinent was far from "absolutley" isolated from the peoples of CA over a period of 2,000 years. It would be near impossible to prove such an ancient movement of people in such a diverse region using sample population genetics, or archelogical remains anyways - including both movements into or out of the subcontinent.
the Anatolian theory has much less support than Eurasian homeland, and OIT has far less than both.
there appears 2 possibilities: 1. Retroflexes represent an indigenous substratum on the present day languages of the subcontinent and eastern Afghanistan, or 2. The presence of retroflex consonants was a random innovation of IA and some eastern Iranian languages. While the feature of retroflexion (T, Th, D, Dh, S, N) is sporadically found also in some other parts of the world (Hock 1986), such as in Scandinavia or Australia (innovative in both cases), it is typical for S. Asia when compared to its neighboring regions, that is Iran, West/Central Asia, the Himalayas, S.E. Asia.[N.136] In the autochthonous scenarios discussed above, the hypothetical emigrants from India would have lost the S. Asian ''bending back of their tongues'' as soon as they crossed the Khyber or Bolan Passes:[N.137] not even Old Iranian (East Iran. Avestan) has these sounds. But, conversely, the Baluchi, who originally were a W. Iranian tribe, have acquired retroflexion -- just in some of their dialects -- only after their arrival on the borders on the subcontinent, early in the second millennium CE (Hoffmann 1941, cf. Hock 1996, Hamp 1996). The same happened to other late, incoming groups such as Parachi, Ormuri (from W. Iran) that are found in E. Afghanistan, and also to some local Iranian Pamir languages such as Wakhi. Clearly, retroflexion affects those moving into the E. Iranian borderland/Indus plain. Importantly, the most widespread appearance of retroflexes is among the cluster of Hindukush/Pamir languages, that is the languages surrounding these mountains in the east (Nuristani/Kafiri, Burushaski, Dardic and the rest of these northernmost IA languages) as well as in the north (some of the Iranian Pamir languages: Wakhi, Yigdha, Sanglechi, Ishkashmi, Khotanese Saka), as detailed by Tikkanen (in Parpola 1994: 166). Retroflexes may also have belonged to a part of the Central Asian/ Afghanistan substrate of the RV (Witzel 1999a,b). Retroflexion clearly is a northwestern regional feature that still is strongest and most varied in this area. Had retroflexion indeed been present in the pre-Iranian or the Proto-Iranian coeval with the (Rg)Vedic period, its effects should be visible in Old Iranian, at least in Avestan[N.138] which was spoken in East Iran, that means in part on the territory of modern Pashto (which has retroflexes indeed). considering the distinctive S Asian geography where they are prevalent, it seems unlikely such innovations would have occured without influence from a neigboring language. In all the cases detailed above, the retroflex is a late, i.e. a Vedic innovation that is not shared by Iranian and the other IE languages. In short, the innovation is rather low down on the 'family pedigree', in cladistics. Any biologist would classify a similar development in biological materials as a clear indicator of a late development, as an innovation, -- in case, one that separates IA from the rest of IIr and IE. In other words, Vedic Sanskrit does not represent the oldest form of IE.
In many ways the IA of the Mitanni actually represents a more archaic form of the IA of the Rig Veda: Rather, is obvious that the remnants of early IA in Mitanni belong to a pre-Rgvedic stage of IA, as is seen in the preservation of IIr -zdh- > Ved. -edh-, in priyamazdha (bi-ir-ia-ma-as'-da[N.154]) : Ved. priyamedha : Avest. -mazdA. These texts also still have IIr ai > Ved. e (aika : eka in aikavartana). Another early item is the retention of IIr. j'h > Ved. h in vas'ana(s')s'aya 'of the race track' = [vaz'hanasya] cf. Ved. vAhana- (EWA II 536, Diakonoff 1971: 80, Hock 1999: 2); they also share the Rgvedic (and Avestan) preference for r (pinkara for piGgala, parita for palita). Importantly, Mitanni-IA has no trace of retroflexion.
Of course we have records of Spanish movements, considering they occured relatively recently and over 3,000 years after the supposed aryan movements. Point being, the aryans most likely represented a language replacement rather than any mass population replacement. As mentioned above, it would be just about impossible to prove such an ancient movement of people using population genetics - particularly in this region of the world has been subject to countless migrations, empires and subsequent admixture. isnt the supposed "aryan marker" R1A1 most frequent among the Turko-Mongol Kirghiz anyways?
Others say the Brahui represent a direct legacy of the IVC and have been in their present location before any IE languages came to the area: http://www.lmp.ucla.edu/Profile.aspx?LangID=207&menu=004 Brahui is the earliest offshoot of Dravidian and its speakers have remained in their present location for several thousands of years (Andronov 2001). At the time of the Dravidian migration (roughly 3-4,000 BC) when other tribes moved south and southeast, the Brahuis remained in place, thus breaking with their kinsfolk. The Brahuis were subject to numerous waves of foreign invaders who influenced various aspects of their culture, such as language and religion.
too often nationalism gets involved with locating where these aryans originated from. This is unfortunate considering they pre-dateD the notions of nationality. even if the aryans came from India, or Ukraine, or wherever, they didnt just fall from the sky. Ultimately we all came from Africa, so africans are the ones with the greatest claim to aryans.
the same can also be said for any movement out of the subcontine however. its unlikely genetics, and to a lesser extent archelogy, can ever help resolve such an ancient issue. Thats why the specialists focus on language, and the linguistic evidence appears heavily stacked against the OIT. |
Posted By: ishwa
Date Posted: 08-Jan-2008 at 22:51
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Originally posted by Kabob1122 the subcontinent was far from "absolutley" isolated from the peoples of CA over a period of 2,000 years. It would be near impossible to prove such an ancient movement of people in such a diverse region using sample population genetics, or archelogical remains anyways - including both movements into or out of the subcontinent.
Of course it wasn’t “absolutely” isolated. There was of course for instance trade. But the impression was originally given that previously an invasion had occurred as it was a fait accompli, then when discarded it was a migration. Now you yourself remark that it would be near impossible to prove for traffic both ways. I agree, that’s why I started my comment with the opening sentence: We know that the Indo-Iranian culture appears from historical times where they are situated now. The rest is speculation as far as there is no clear prove for either AIT, AMT, OIT or what T. But the basic point is the word “theory”. And it has to be stressed that it is just that, no theory is holy or holier. It is just that, a theory, nothing more, whether supported by many or a few. They are all being criticized by a few or more, because it’s dealing with theories. When it becomes a fact, then it is something else. Originally posted by Kabob1122 there appears 2 possibilities: Is the Avesta canon, and especially the Gathic part as we have it, still the same with the same original sound values as the one composed in the RV times? The pre-Sasanian Avesta canon is lost to us. The collated, screened, augmented, and newly canonized (and lost) Sasanian canon is from ca. 650 CE! (Even the Pahlavi works were still getting reshapes or revisions to suit the times upto the 10th century.) The extant Avesta, mostly religious, has been reshaped, sometimes after the 10th century. So, if the NW borderland of E-Iranian and Indic is the retroflex zone, and as it affects languages coming to that zone, isn’t it equally possible that outside that influential zone retroflexes lose their character and importance? Originally posted by Kabob1122 In all the cases detailed above, the retroflex is a late, i.e. a Vedic innovation that is not shared by Iranian and the other IE languages. I didn’t say that it was the oldest form. Neither that the retroflex was a not a Vedic innovation. I commented on your sentence “and it uses Dravidian retroflexes which are absent from all other IE languages.“ The remark Dravidian retroflexes is not in agreement with the remark Vedic innovations.
Originally posted by Kabob1122 In many ways the IA of the Mitanni actually represents a more archaic form of the IA of the Rig Veda: I didn’t say it is not archaic. But what’s the point, it only shows that the IA loans in for instance Hurri language were conservative, while the Vedic was more progressive in the time when the Pathas (!) occurred. Does it say anything of the Vedic sounds or clusters in the times of the composers or more of the Vedic sounds of the much later Pathakaras? The non-retroflexion “trace” in Mitanni area may be more complicated. We simply do not know how the loan words were pronounced by the Hurri people. The IA words were loans in their language. Besides, the local writing systems of W-Asia weren’t made for retroflex sounds which were alien to that world before the IA loans turned up.. Originally posted by Kabob1122 Others say the Brahui represent a direct legacy of the IVC and have been in their present location before any IE languages came to the area: Originally posted by Kabob1122 even if the aryans came from India, or Ukraine, or wherever, they didnt just fall from the sky. Ultimately we all came from Africa, so africans are the ones with the greatest claim to aryans. This is precisely what is wrong. The only people calling themselves as Arya or Airiia were the Iranic and indic people, non other! (I personally prefer the spelling “Arya” above “Aryan”, which was polluted in the time theories on races were prevalent and with Nazism using that for their distorted case till today.) Originally posted by Kabob1122 the same can also be said for any movement out of the subcontine however. its unlikely genetics, and to a lesser extent archelogy, can ever help resolve such an ancient issue. Thats why the specialists focus on language, and the linguistic evidence appears heavily stacked against the OIT. Whatever any theory whether linguistic or not, whether into or outside, comes up with, it has to deal with archaeology, etc. in consonance. Again stressing, that till then it us just a theory. I want to correct your last sentence in that’s why linguistic specialists focus on language, ….. We have seen that linguists disagree amongst themselves on linguistic theories when dealing with movements from one and to another particular identifiable locality of their branches. And so far when dealing with other fields of research. Linguistics didn’t appear to be the one or sole magical solution to these issues, after more than 100 years of intensive research. So, linguistics, is also unlikely to resolve such an ancient issue. |
Posted By: ishwa
Date Posted: 10-Jan-2008 at 14:11
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B.t.w. I am not against linguistics, far from that. But some axiomata, paradigmata and conclusions arrived at within linguistics are obviouslyy not that fruitful and may have to be re-examined and reformulated, while apparantly being incompatible with other data and disciplines, rather than looking at and branding other disciplines for being unlikely to resolve issues.
All the disciplines have their equal importance. I sense in the words of archaeologists like Lamberg-Karlovsky “The identity of the Indo-Iranians remains elusive. When they are identified in the archaeological record it is by allegation rather than demonstration.”,
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 14-Jan-2008 at 15:19
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Thieme - Thieme has questioned Dravidian etymologies proposed for Vedic words, most of which he gives Indoaryan or Sanskrit etymologies, and condemned what he characterizes as a misplaced “ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeal - zeal for hunting up http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dravidian - Dravidian loans in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanskrit - Sanskrit ”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rahul_Peter_Das - Das contends that there is “not a single case in which a communis opinio has been found confirming the foreign origin of a Rgvedic (and probably Vedic in general) word”.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 14-Jan-2008 at 17:13
I will give out the facts and let you make your own deductions from it. The conflict which the Rig Veda mentions which earlier was taken to mean the conflict between indo aryans and the natives of India is now almost universally acknowledged as the event when the Indo-Iranian seperation took place. Almost all the enemies of the Vedic Aryans mentioned in that battle have Iranian cognates, Dasa is Iranian Daha, Dasysus is Iranian Dahyu, Pani is Iranian Parnoi, Purshu is Iranian Persian, Parthu is Iranian Parthian, Madya is Iranian Medians, Pakhta is Pakhtun, Bhalana is Bolan/Baloch. What is interesting is the tribe called Bhrgu. It sounds a lot like Bruhi. Now consider that Bruhi in Pakistan exists among the Balochis orginally an Iranian tribe. The balochis are quite a letcomer into this area they only came here in about 1200 A.D. If Bruhi was present here since the Harappan times then youn really expect that it should borrow a lot from the Indo-Aryan languages. But really that is not the case, it has borrowed a lot from Balochi and also consider that Bruhi as a distinct Ethnic group does not exist outisde the Balochis in either Pakistan or India (north or south) but exists only in Iran, Afghanistan and Turkemanistan, areas where the Iranians always had a strong presence and especially in Iran and Turkaemanistan where the Indo-Aryans never had any significant presence. These are the facts and you can make your own most likely deductions from it. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 14-Jan-2008 at 17:23
Yes you are right about that. Since we have Hittite in writting from 1500 B.C that does make Hittite the oldest attested IE language. Many think that Sanskrit goes back to at least 1500 B.C however since we don't have it in writting therefore it can not be certified. If Iduis Valley Civilization script is deciphered and found out to be Aryan then that would make the underlying language the oldest attested IE language, however until that is deciphered if it is ever deciphered then that makes hittie as the oldest IE lanbguage. However what about the Mitanni horse manual, it is written in almost pure Sanskrit which would make the language almost as old as Hittite.
not quite. In fact the earliest written evidence of an Indo-Aryan language is found in Syria, via Hittite treaty with their Hurrian speaking Mitanni neighbors. This follows suit well geographically with a parallel movement of IA speaking nomads out of Central Asia into India and Mesopotamia. "The possibility that a small group broke off and wandered from India into Western Asia is readily dismissed as an improbably long migration, again without the least bit of evidence." -J.P Mallory[/QUOTE] |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 14-Jan-2008 at 17:39
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There is not necessarily a direct realtionship between a language which is closest to the Proto language and its proxomity to the geographical homeland. The language closest to Proto North Germanic is Icelandic yet we know that Icleand is not the home of the proto Germanics. Why that is so is simple. When the Germanics broke off from Scandenavianas they moved into Germany and because of interaction with the other populations their language moved away from proto-Germanic while when the Scandenevians moved into Icleand because of isolation their language remained largely unchanged because of which it is the closest language to Proto-Germanic that we have. Similarly when the Iranians and the Europeans migrations were taking place we had the elite language of Vedic Sanskrit but not but the migrators took onlyb the native languages and not the Elite language much like how in the Americas European took the native languages of Portugese, English and Spanish but not the Elite languages of Latin and Greek. Then the groups which stayed behinde and founded the Indus Valley Civilization at its decline moved into the West Asia and their native language which later became Hittite had a much closer genetical realtionship with the languages of Europe.
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 20:25
Good Observations.
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 20:49
Visited this thread after along time .
Man you should be given a noble prize for such discoveries ....
After that stunning discovery of Prakrit created by Moryas you have produced another masterpiece that Aryans never had a significant presence in Turkmenistan and Iran.Darius who called himself Arya or People of Turkmenistan who celebrated and dedicated year 2006 for their Aryans ancestors might be wondering what is the source for your strange revelations. For Turkmenistan just read this ........
President Emomaly Rahmonov declared year 2006 as Year for Revival of Aryan Civilisation. Government of Tajikistan announced through Academy of Sciences the official Conference on this topic to be held on 7th September 2006 as part of the official 15th Anniversary celebrations....
http://www.fravahr.org/spip.php?article266 - http://www.fravahr.org/spip.php?article266
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 26-Jan-2008 at 21:07
There are always different point of views on any topic but propaganda groups as Hindutava Lobby always have a set agenda and try to distort facts to suit a particular objective .One can hardly expect an honest discussion in such scenarios
BTW
If I am not wrong you are Satish Mishra of Hindu Unity group another Hindutava Site.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 28-Jan-2008 at 01:40
Ah Mr. Azat welcome back. I was missing you (honestly) for i had no one to have a bit of rough conversation with. Well what can i say most of the people to this thread have been a bit too well mannered.
And before flagging somebody off first take the time to actually think that what that person is saying.
I said that apart from Afghanistan which was considered part of the subcontinental sphere for a long time and was called Gandhara, "Indo-Aryans" never had a significant presence either in Turkemanistan and Iran and as far as i am aware Iranians are not considered Indo-Aryan but naturally enough Iranian-Aryans.
If you have information of Indo-Aryans such as the Jats, Rajputs, Mers etc ever having been in Turkemanistan and Iran please inform me.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 28-Jan-2008 at 01:42
| And i have answered your objections. Please read that post before going any further. |
Posted By: ishwa
Date Posted: 28-Jan-2008 at 19:48
There are more lobby groups with their own interests and sets of agendas. In the academia there is awareness of this phenomenon. But I am not interested in that. Such a waste of time. Branding one into any lobby or group isn't helping much to resolve discussion matters. It has nothing to do with discussing on topic with arguments, whatever one's personal opinion or background is. If one agrees or disagrees, it must be on bare facts on topic.
I am not "of the Hindu Unity group" or member of any group. Visiting independantly and open-minded any discussion forum, whether a linguistic, historical, Hindutva-branded or non-Hindutva branded, etc. doesn't make me anything. I have been perhaps solely on this forum for the last months, when having some time, does it make me a member of an "all empire-tva" ideology? How ridiculous.
Again, if one agrees or disagrees, just present the bare facts on topic. Hopefully discussions will be held on topics and not on persons.
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 29-Jan-2008 at 13:31
Well Mishra my aim to inquire was just to save time as arguments for Aryan Invasion Theory by Ishwa /Satish Mishra were already posted in that Hindutava Site I hope you got my point.
Since I read it long ago I erred a little , correct name was Hindunet not Hindu Unity.
http://www.hindunet.com/forum/showprofile.php?Cat=&User=10963&Board=animals&what=ubbthreads&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o - http://www.hindunet.com/forum/showprofile.php?Cat=&User=10963&Board=animals&what=ubbthreads&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o =
Here you discussed Aryan Invasion theory via Who are the Aryans -Who else but we .
Just to start debate ,my views here was If Gangetic Brahmins like (Mishra Pandeys Tripathis etc..) think they are the original Aryans than either they are sadly mistaken or just trying to distort History nothing else.
Let us discuss it ...
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 29-Jan-2008 at 13:42
Nice Back Drive Bilal.
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Posted By: Azat
Date Posted: 29-Jan-2008 at 14:02
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Bilal please think if Prakrit would have been just a mixture of Tamil and Sanskrit developed by Moriyas than Tamil Scholars might have easily discovered that long ago ,So only I posted that comment.
Regarding Jats and Mers/Meds in Iran and Turkmenistan Jats were first recorded controlling Kimran and Sistan Routes of Iran by Arabians,Meds are repeatedly mentioned in Iranian History ,Chinese Turkistan ,and Mughalistan areas are mentioned as Nation of Jattas Anyway that is a separate topic.
If you are arguing for OIT We will discuss it.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 29-Jan-2008 at 19:14
Ok now you are talking. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 29-Jan-2008 at 19:17
Trust me my man, the reason i said that Prakrit was mixture of Aryan and Dravidian is because i had heard that statement quite a few times from historians. Why not should we ask a tamil that what are his views on Prakrit. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 29-Jan-2008 at 19:36
Meds are repeatedly mentioend in Iranian history is because Medes were an Iranian tribe. The Medes are certainly not Mers. -Link- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-Mede - -Excerpts- The Medes were an http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Iranian_peoples - ancient Iranian people http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-0 - [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-1 - [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-2 - [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-3 - [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-4 - [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-5 - [6] who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran - Iran , and roughly the areas of present day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan - Kurdistan , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamedan - Hamedan , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tehran - Tehran , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azarbaijan - Azarbaijan , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isfahan_Province - Esfahan and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zanjan - Zanjan . This area was known in Greek as Media or Medea (Μηδία, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Persian - Old Persian Māda; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-Athura - [7] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-kent-p396 - [8] adjective Median, antiquated also Medean). -Excerpts- Under http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Assyrian_Empire - Assyrian rule , the Medes were known as Mādāyu. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medes#_note-Mede - [9] And the fact that they were known as Madayu under Assyrian rule proves my point that the Madya tribe mentioned in the RIg-Veda were the Medes. Chinese Turkistan ,and Mughalistan areas are mentioned as Nation of Jattas Anyway that is a separate topic. Huh Chinese Turkistan a nation of Jats. I did not knew about that. Please give me your source that where you got that from . And since Mughal empire was centered in the sub-continent you do expect it to be sometimes called a nation of Jats. However i do not understand that what that has to do with Tukemanistan. |
Posted By: ishwa
Date Posted: 29-Jan-2008 at 21:55
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Since I read it long ago I erred a little , correct name was Hindunet not Hindu Unity. http://www.hindunet.com/forum/showprofile.php?Cat=&User=10963&Board=animals&what=ubbthreads&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o - http://www.hindunet.com/forum/showprofile.php?Cat=&User=10963&Board=animals&what=ubbthreads&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o = I have said that I visited any site. I have been on that forum roughly around that year, not been there afterwards. It was my first experience with a discussion forum online. Before I accepted AIT, later through a few indologists [non-South-Asians] amongst my friends there were raised some question marks with regard to invasions etc. Then I entered the forum. AIT was in that time the axioma, of which I was sceptical too. That theory was later on rightly admitted to be wrong, by the mainstream proponents of the AIT! No big deal.
Aaah, thus it is about that? Hindutva …., Brahmins… Mishra…. I do not believe in castes, as a historian I do notice these in primary sources in different settings and contexts. My experience in forums is that quite a few South-Asians, proponents and opponents are caste-occupied (or nowadays group-centered) in their discussions, some opponents are even obsessed. No such phenomena, with one incidental exception, I have met with in my discussions with non-South-Asian specialists. Are you starting a debate? It sounds more like a personal view is presented with the words “,my views here was …” starting with a generalization with “ … If Gangetic Brahmins like (Mishra Pandeys Tripathis etc..) think they are the original Aryans”. B.t.w. I cannot recall having said or supported such a vague sentence or idea. (See my posting in this thread where I remarked that only Iranics and Indics are the ones who had called themselves “Arya”. No trace of the word “Brahmin”!) Are there some statistics with the percentage amongst members of that group that “think” this way? What is “original Aryans”?And what does a “Gangetic Brahmin” understand with that word? Have they been interviewed on this? What about “non-Gangetic Brahmins”? What about non-Brahmins? Even if someone believes something, does it mean he is “just trying to distort History nothing else”? That is why there are academic studies and academic publications to check the context and value of these. Ancient Iranian “Airiya” believed in the Avesta that they were “the original Aryans” and their kinsmen the “Tuirya” were not (anymore, as they weren’t included as “Airiya”). Does it mean that they were also (like) “Gangetic Brahmins” in the above referred context? Why only mentioning “Gangetic Brahmins” and not the Iranian “Airiya”?
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Posted By: creek
Date Posted: 03-Feb-2008 at 01:06
| Aryan invasion is just theory. it should never be confused with real events. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 04-Feb-2008 at 01:45
A theory which has been pretty much treated as a fact.
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 04-Feb-2008 at 19:14
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It has been said that linguistics do not suppport OIT. Now lets discuss linguistic evidence favourable for OIT.
It happens that when an invader comes into a new land he is dependent on the locals for the knowledge of the land and as a result calls the places what the Natives call the places. e.g in America the British invaded the land however they to a large extent retained the native names for these places. AS an illustration lets examine the USA states and see that how many of them have native american source.
Alabama- Native American Alaska- Native American Arizona- Native American Arkansas- Native American California- Non Native American Colorado- Native American Connecticut- Native American Delaware- Native American District of Columbia- Non Native American Florida- Non Native American Georgia- Not sure Hawaii- Native American Idaho- Native American Illinois- Native American Indiana- Although not of native origin but meaning land of the natives whatever they maybe called (in this case Indians) Iowa- Native American Kansas- Native American Kentucky- Native American Louisiana- Native American Maine- Native American Maryland- Non Native American Massachusetts- Native American Michigan- Native American Minnesota- Native American Mississippi- Native American Missouri- Native American Montana- Non Native American Nebraska- Native American Nevada- Native American New Hampshire- Non Native American New Jersey- Non Native American New Mexico- Native American (Mexico is a native American name) New York - Non Native American North Carolina- Non Native American North Dakota- Native American Ohio- Native American Oklahoma- Native American Oregon- Native American Pennsylvania- Non Native American Rhode Island- Non Native American South Carolina- Non Native American South Dakota- Native American Tennessee- Native American Texas- Native American Utah- Native American Vermont- Native American Virginia- Non Native American Washington- Non Native American West Virginia- Non Native American Wisconsin- Native American Wyoming - Native American
Of the 51 states only 16 have a non-native american name the names of the rest of the states are of Native extract. And this is in a country where only 1 percent of the population is of Native extract. TE native languages have affected American English very little, even the native flaura and fauna do not haev a native source in American English e.g Potato, Tomato, Peanuts, avocado etc. Yet a very large part of the old local place names haev a native American source. However here in this the place names in the modern northern India and Pakistan almost all have a IE etymologies. In the Rig-Veda too a alrge part of the place names and river names have IE etymologies. This is simply not compatible with AIT where. Bryant 2001 A non-Indo-Aryan substratum in the river-names and place-names of the Rigvedic homeland would support an external origin of the Indo-Aryans. However, most place-names in the Rigveda and the vast majority of the river-names in the north-west of India are Indo-Aryan |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 03-Mar-2008 at 08:55
| Watch out for some really interesting posts here. I am busy typing my arguments into a cohesive whole. |
Posted By: athenas owl
Date Posted: 04-Mar-2008 at 18:40
Just a correction to your list, the corrections are bolded...there are 26 out of the 51 states/district. Spanish being an IE langauage and a couple fo the states flat out have made up names. Also, I found it rather funny that you would try to call Indiana a "Native American" name by default...since the Native Americans never called themselves Indian. And I think you do not understand the history of the US and it's expansion. As for Local place names, rather the artificially created states, the US has towns named for every area on Earth...everything from Spanish Names, especially in the West. And while the great rivers (some of them..others like the Columbia, the Sacramento, the Rio Grande, are named in European languages..as well as untold numbers of great cities...from Los Angeles to New York, from Atlanta to San Fransisco, from Boston to Dallas/Fort Worth, from New Orleans to Portland, etc, etc, etc. Regards. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 05-Mar-2008 at 07:36
I don't get your point. Of course there are going to be a lot of Spanish names in the US because of Spanish presence there. And of course there will be a lot of made up names. The US founded many new cities and towns. And that is jus my point, the newly created towns and sites were not named to a Native American name, but the old name places have a large Native American source. Really you don't expect a town founded today to have a Native American source but far back in time when the Europeans arrived here they called the locations what the Natives called them. And of course since many new sites were founded they had a European source.
And regards Oregan i have said that its origin is unknown not that it is Natives American for sure.
And regards New Indiana i clearly said that Indiana is not a Native name yet it is what the Europeans called the natives and so that means city of the natives and means that there was a division of invaders and natives in America proving that there were some invaders in America at that time. It is claimed that Melaccha is what the Aryan invaders called the natives had there been a town in Pakistan called something like "Melacchapur" (City of the Melacchas) then it would be an argument in favour of AIT as it would be mean that a site in Pakistan had the name "city of the natives".
And there were many sites for either which the Natives had no names because they never lived there in significant number or simply the Naitve names for that place was not known and hence the colconizers got a little innovative. But i have not collected those names by any fixed critieria but by simpe indiscriminately choosing a random sample. I am sure that that this analysis will apply in many other areas of the world also where the invaders subjugaetd the locals. For example a large number of place and river names in turkey will have a non-turkic source.
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Posted By: ruffian
Date Posted: 05-Mar-2008 at 15:15
Eagerly waiting! Fascinating. Thanks. |
Posted By: athenas owl
Date Posted: 05-Mar-2008 at 19:31
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" I don't get your point. Of course there are going to be a lot of Spanish names in the US because of Spanish presence there. And of course there will be a lot of made up names. The US founded many new cities and towns. And that is jus my point, the newly created towns and sites were not named to a Native American name, but the old name places have a large Native American source. Really you don't expect a town founded today to have a Native American source but far back in time when the Europeans arrived here they called the locations what the Natives called them. And of course since many new sites were founded they had a European source."
My point was that you had a list of the states and DC and had the supposed origin of the names as "Native Amercian"..which a number of them were incorrect. Spanish is not Native American and Louisiana is not Native American, it is French (after King Loius) as Georgis is named after the British King George. There were no Native American cities to refound (as there would be in the much more populated and historically much more "advanced" Indus Valley. Also, the western North American continent was first entered by trappers, missionaries and other small groups, British and French (in the Pacific Northwest we have cities hat are named from the French, the British and the Native American groups...the largest city so named would be Seattle after a famous Native American chief.)) in small numbers who, rather than being conquorers, were on their own. They called the rivers as the Natives did and as other white men followed them, these later groups adopted the same custom. Had the conquorers come first, who knows how it would have gone. As it is, the biggest river system on the west coast is called the Columbia. So much of the West bears Spanish names, from Californis and all it's great cities, many of the coastal features all the way to the northern border of the United States. And the second is of Spanish origin. But again that is a European language. But bottom line..I just wanted to correct your list as it was wrong..and to point out how many of the Native American names came to stick. And again point out that comparing the heavily populated Indus Valley with the sparsely populated North American continent. Not that the Native Americans derserved what happened (my great grand mother was Native American), but the comparison is weak. I'm not in any camp reagrding invasion or migration, but I do believe that the OIT is not workable. The language trail does not follow. I'm all for the old Eurocentric paradigm being thrown aside, but folks must be careful to not go to the other extreme in reaction. Whoever the IE people were, they were not European, they were their own culture, and some of them went west, as some of them went south and east. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 21-Mar-2008 at 14:21
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What many people seem to miss is the central role of Indus Valley Civilization in this debate. By the AIT aryans came to this region in 1500 B.C. So before that this region was not Aryan. And Indus Valley Civilization is the greatest archeological relic that which we have before that time. So by the AIT the Indus Valley Civilization cannot be aryan and therefore there must be a sharp divide between the Indus Valley Civilization and the later Aryan cultures. When the Aryan Invasion Theory was being formulated the Indus Valley Civilization was not known. It was assumed that it was the Aryans from Europe who came to this region and founded the Indian civilization. But when Indus Valley Civilization was discovered it threw a serious spanner in the works. To explain away this anomaly the idea was presented that when the original Aryans here they destroyed the Indus Valley Civilization and going by this line of thinking Mortimer Wheeler after excavating Mohenjodaro saw a massacre in Mohenjodaro because of some skeletons found in Mohenjodaro. They further reasoned that the Dravidians in the south were somehow the creators of Indus Valley Civlization because they were darker skinned not because they live in a very sunny climate but because they that it is their so called race because in the Rig Veda we find the struggle between lightness and darkness which was in a very strange twist of logic they interpreted as the fight between light skinned people and dark skinned people. And the Aryans who were thought to have been the sophisticated creator of the Indian civilization and whose decline was because of mixing with the locals now suddenly became illiterate, barbaric namads who destroyed a very sophisticated native civilization when they arrived here. Oh how quickly the cookie crumbles. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 21-Mar-2008 at 14:22
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Now since Indus Valley Civilization was there before the arrival of Aryans in 1500 B.C hence they cannot be Aryans. So here we will present the various relics of Indus Valley Culture which are present not only in the later Aryan Cultures of India and Pakistan but also in the Aryan cultures of Iran as well as Europe, which would pretty much mean that the Indus Valley Civilization despite all claims to the contrary by the AIT side was indeed very much Aryan like if not being exactly Aryan itself. |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 21-Mar-2008 at 14:27
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Here is linga cult relic found in Harappa  Here is a linga cum yoni in a modern temple  |
Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 21-Mar-2008 at 14:40
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Here are the various figurines in depicted in yogic postures  Here is a figure on a seal in a yogic posture
 Of course as you know the "science" of Yoga survives us to this day and has influenced many regions who have came inotm contact with the culture of the subcontinent. Bhuddism adopted it as their way of mediation from where it traveled to the east asian countries especially in their martial arts traditions.
Ahmed Dani is of the view that the mediation practiced in sufism came from Bhuddism.
-Link-
http://www.harappa.com/script/danitext.html - http://www.harappa.com/script/danitext.html
-Excerpt-
"For example, when I talk about the meditation derived in Islam today among the Sufis, and when I say it is derived from Buddhism, all the Muslims say no, it is nonsense to say that, but I know it is a derivation"
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Posted By: bilal_ali_2000
Date Posted: 21-Mar-2008 at 15:05
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Here is a boat as used by the people of Indus Valley Civilization as depicted no a seal  Here is a boat as used by the people of Pakistan today
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